


"The Duck Chat" is Both Literal and a Metaphor

by the_one_a_m_writer



Series: Flags [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Agender Character, Aromantic Character, Asexual Character, Bisexual Character, Deaf Clint Barton, Gay Character, Genderfluid Character, LGBTQ Character, LGBTQ Female Character, Some pronoun misuse before a character comes out, This is a LGBT+ Story, lots of lgbtq characters, there's no hate in this story but there is a bit of misunderstanding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-30
Updated: 2018-10-09
Packaged: 2019-07-20 22:41:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 21,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16147070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_one_a_m_writer/pseuds/the_one_a_m_writer
Summary: Peter and Tony's secret project is on everyone's minds. Steve starts to figure out more about the project as it goes on, but he also learns more about the team. This story is certainly classified as LGBT+ Fiction.





	1. The Fortunate Unfortunate Life of one Steve Rogers

**Author's Note:**

> Timeline! ONLY PARTLY CANON COMPLIANT: Most of what's happening you can figure out from context. Winter Soldier happened. The Sokovia Accords happened, but differently. Scarlet Witch and Vision are not in this story. Bucky is mentioned but currently unavailable, possibly in cyro in Wakanda. Homecoming happened, but I think at the end Peter said yes to Tony's question. Ragnarok went way differently-- Asgard exists.  
> Identity! I did a lot of research, but if I messed up and am misrepresenting your gender/sexuality, I welcome constructive criticism. That said, please keep in mind that not everyone has the same experience with their identity and that each character is only able to represent one facet of the identity they are in this story.  
> Perspective! I've written 3rd Person Limited, aka "It's in 3rd Person but readers only know what Steve knows."

Steve Rogers, Starbucks mocha in one hand and a double espresso in the other, set off to find Peter and Tony. The billionaire had been working on some project involving the entire team’s costumes for the last week, and Peter had just been pulled in.  
The textile shop was probably a good place to start…

  
Steve rounded a corner into the shop, shouldering open the door. He looked around, about to call out for Tony and Peter—

  
Wham!

  
Steve dropped the coffee (at least the floors in this room were concrete, not carpet) and instinctually braced against his attacker, wrapping his arms around them.

“Mr. America!!”

The little attacker started squirming in Steve’s grasp, trying to face him. The web he’d been swinging from dribbled from his grasp.

“Hi Peter.”

Peter Parker, in costume except for the hood, finally wiggled around so he could talk face to face with Steve. He braced his arms on Steve’s shoulders.

“Sorry for crashing into you! Mr. Stark and I are working on something super cool for me and him and also the entire team! You should see the costumes! Hey, guess what else?!”

“What’s that?” Steve asked, grinning in amusement.

“The entire team, we’re go—”

“PETER, IT’S A SURPRISE!!”

“Hi Tony!” Steve called out. Faintly, he heard Peter mumble “oops!” behind his hand. “I’ve got your kid!”

“Can you bring them back here?”

Steve slung Peter over his shoulder and walked over, ignoring the boy’s screeching. “Here you are,” he said, throwing Peter at Tony.  
Peter shot web at the ceiling and flipped, putting himself comfortably stationary between Steve and Tony. He was upside down, but then again, he was upside down most of the time.

“Mr. America, look at my costume!”

He laced his feet to the web and released his hands, spreading his arms so that Steve got the full view.

“Why the redesign, kid?

Peter looked at Steve, then Tony, then Steve, then somewhat mournfully at Tony, who was staring him down sternly. “I’m not supposed to say.”

“That’s right, my young spiderling.” Tony nodded and turned back to his desk.

“It’s cool though, right, Mr. America?”

 

The new costume was largely the same except for the coloring: the blue had become pale grey and the red had become a lime green. The spider on Peter’s chest faded from pink to blue.

“It’s pretty cool, Peter. Are we doing away with the blue and red for good?”

“Nahhh, I like blue and red too much. This is temporary. It’s just for—hey! Mr. Stark!”

Peter curled inward on himself, withdrawing his ticklish sides from Tony’s reach.

“No spoilers, kiddo!”

“Sorry, Mr. Stark.”

Steve finally caught a glimpse of the fabric on the table. It was very clearly the avengers’ costumes, but as he moved to look around Tony, Tony hopped up on the table to sit over all of the costumes, striking a pose and grinning at Steve.

“Nice cover-up.”

“What am I covering up?”

Steve rolled his eyes.

“Didn’t you have coffee for me and my minion?”

“Someone crashed into me and I dropped it.”

“Oh. Sorry, Mr. America.”

Tony shoved himself off the table. Steve tried to look, of course, but a lid slid down to cover the fabric.

“No peeking,” Tony said. “I’m going to get myself some coffee, I guess. I could use a break anyway.”

“You could?” Steve asked in shock.

“Aren’t you always telling me to take breaks? You should be proud. Kid, c’mere.”

Steve stared.

Peter allowed himself to be pulled to the side by Tony, who whispered something in his ear. Peter nodded enthusiastically and bounded back to Steve.

“Hey, Mr. America. While Mr. Stark is taking a break, d’you wanna go get coffee?”

“Are you going to make me go to Starbucks again?”

“Nah. I like Starbucks, but only because there’s Starbucks everywhere and everyone else always gets Starbucks. There’s better chain restaurants, you know? But the really good restaurants—”

“Do you want to put street clothes on before we go?” Steve interrupted, knowing that Peter wouldn’t take offense because if not stopped, he could ramble for days.

“Oh! Yeah, I should. Thanks for reminding me, Mr. America.”

The superhero zipped away and returned moments later in jeans, tugging down a yellow sweater. “Let’s go walk downtown!”

…

They ended up walking down a street that bordered a large lake. Peter’s strides were barely more than half of Steve’s, but he kept up with endless energy, pointing out various local points of interest.

“Those saplings were just planted. That light’s been broken for a long time, so it never turns on. That’s where I crashed into a mailbox because I had too much webbing out. It’s still got a dent, see?”

Steve did see, and wondered how this kid was still alive.

“That woman takes her American flag down suuuper careful and folds it. You know, I learned how you were actually supposed to fold the flag once? It’s really hard. I don’t think I ever did it right. I bet you did, though.”

“I still do,” Steve said. “That flag Tony has outside of Avengers tower has 24/7 lighting, so we never take it down.”

“Oh, yeah. That’s cool.”

“How did you learn all of this in such a short time, Peter?”

“When I’m bored, I go wander around the streets. That’s what I used to do at home, anyway, so I’m used to it. I’m always out as Spider-Man, though. One time, I stopped a mugging! The girl wasn’t even hurt or anything, so that’s cool. Another time, I saw a stray kitten and I knew Mr. Stark wouldn’t let me keep it in the tower so I found this lady who has, like, a million cats and asked her if she could help. She said yes, she would, so sometimes I ask Mr. Stark for money for coffee and I spend it on cat food instead and I give it to the woman.”

Steve wanted to hug Peter, and reminded himself to tell Tony about the cats. He was sure the billionaire would not be so heartless as to deny the boy an extra fund for cat food.

“Anyway, yeah, there’s more stuff too. That flag is always there,” Peter said, pointing to a flag with stripes of baby blue, white, pink, white, baby blue. “In June, that window on the direct opposite has a rainbow flag. I like to think that when the owner is hanging up the flag for pride, the other owner peeks out through the window and they’re window friends.”

Peter’s voice had gotten calmer.

“Why’s that?”

“Well, you know, because they’re both LBGT? So maybe when that one’s feeling a little out of place—” Peter points to blue-and-pink—“They sit in the window and they smile because the other one is holding up a little inspirational poster because they know what it’s like.”

“You sound like you’ve seen them.”

“I’ve seen people like them.”

“What’s LGBT?”

Peter stared at Steve in shock. “This is this century’s women’s suffrage! This is this century’s interracial marriage!”

“Calm down.” Steve grinned at Peter, putting a comforting hand on his shoulders. “I know about the gay rights stuff. I just don’t know what the acronym stands for. I feel bad about it. You’d probably know, because you grew up with it.”

Steve had known of some homosexuals during his time in the army, but never could bring himself to hate or fear them like some seemed to. Maybe he knew even then that people would be more accepting one day, but he never could have predicted the Supreme Court’s decision happening in his lifetime—he remembered how euphoric the day of the decision felt.

“Ohhhh.” Peter’s face lit up just like the time Bruce asked about the chemical composition of the spider web, and Steve prepared himself for a long and animated explanation. “I mean, technically, the acronym stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, right? It’s supposed to be inclusive of all the sexualities and genders, but it’s not, so people expand the acronym to LGBTQIA+, which a lot of people don’t agree with. I’ve been trying to get people to follow MJ’s way, which is GSRM, for Gender Sexuality Romantic Minorities—I said her way, but she didn’t come up with it, but she was the first person I heard it from. One day she just told me—”  
Peter stopped for breath.

“One day she and I had this random conversation and she was like oh I just call it GSRM which is weird not because of what she said, but the fact that she said it like she knew I was looking for something more inclusive, even though I wasn’t out to her anyway. I dunno what MJ is but I doubt she’s straight.”  
Peter looked up at Steve. “What was I talking about?”

“You were going to tell me what all the different words in the acronym mean.”

“Okay, so there’s gender; some people are born female but they feel like they’re a guy or vice versa, so that’s trans. There’s surgery and hormone therapy and stuff but some trans people decide not to do that. Then there’s people who don’t feel like a guy or a girl, so they have different ways of expressing themselves and whatever. There’s lots of different people and lots of different terms for how people are…”

Steve was nodding; Peter continued.

“And there’s also sexuality which is basically who you like, but it’s a little more complicated than that, right? Because there’s sexual attraction and romantic attraction which you can probably figure out what that is—”

Seemed simple enough, Steve nodded again—

“So people can have different sexual and romantic attraction. There’s like, gay? And lesbian? Which is pretty simple, right, they’re just attracted to the same gender. Then there’s bi, or pan, which is bisexual and pansexual. That’s being attracted to like… not just your own gender or not just the opposite gender, right? Um.”  
Peter whacked the leaves of a low-hanging branch as he passed it.

“But some people aren’t sexually attracted to anyone, and that’s asexual. And some people aren’t romantically attracted to anyone, and that’s aromantic. So like if you aren’t sexually attracted to anyone but you’re romantically attracted to guys and girls you’d be biromantic.”

Peter paused, looking down and stepping carefully over a high curb.

“That’s like… it. Generally. The basics. This is the coffee shop I like to go to…”  
Steve looked up; there was a little local coffee shop in front of them. He was surprised at the quick turn that their conversation had taken, but said nothing.

“Is it any good?”

“Yes. The best is their house special. I don’t really get iced coffee here because there’s a different coffee shop in a different place that’s better.”

“I guess I’ll have to try the house special, then.”

Peter flung open the door, which made a pleasant tinkling sound, and strolled in. “Hi, Emi!”

Emi gave him a confused look. Steve was willing to bet that Peter had made her acquaintance as Spider-Man, and had forgotten that he was Peter Parker at the moment.

“Hello,” Steve said, stepping up to Peter. “I’ve been told I should order the house special?”

“Yeah, it’s pretty good,” Emi said, studying his face like she was trying to figure out who he was.

“Two of them, actually,” Peter piped up.

“Yeah, okay. Um, do I know you?” Emi asked.

“You’ve probably seen us on television,” Steve said. “Peter interns at Stark Industries and I work with the Avengers.”

Peter made a face at Steve, probably because of how vague he was being. “Emi, this is Captain America.”

She gasped. “Really?”

“Really.”

“One moment.”

She ran into the kitchen. There was excited chattering for a few minutes, and then she re-emerged as part of a group of five girls, one of whom was holding two cups of coffee.

Steve and Peter took the coffee.

“It’s on us,” one of the girls said.

“This is so cool!”

“I never thought I would meet an Avenger in person!”

“You’re my favorite avenger.”

“Thank you,” Steve said. “How much do I owe you?”

“It’s freeee!” they insisted.

One of the girls held out a piece of paper to sign, so Steve did, and immediately had to sign four more. The girls thanked him profusely and clutched their new treasures to their chest.

Steve slipped $100 in the tip jar as he walked away, whispering, “It’s Tony’s money.”

Peter giggled.

“Do you wanna go see the ducks?” he asked. “I have something to tell them.”

…

The ducks seemed to expect something from Peter.

“Sorry, guys, I didn’t bring any bread today.”

“Do you come by here a lot?”

“Yeah. I tell them what’s going on. They’re my friends.”

The ducks had figured out that Peter didn’t have any food, and were acting decidedly less interested. They settled in the grass around the two avengers.

“What were you going to tell them today?”

“Oh. Um. Yeah. Remember the stuff I told you earlier?”

Peter told Steve a lot of stuff earlier. Steve nodded, because he figured he would as soon as Peter clued him into where this conversation was going.

“It’s pretty cool,” Peter told the ducks, “that people are way more accepting of different genders and sexualities now. Also, on the internet, no matter how you are, there’s a bunch of other people like you and they know exactly what it’s like. I spent so much time googling stuff about LG—uh. GSRM.”

Peter glanced at Steve, and pointedly back at the ducks. “I’m trying to use GSRM for MJ. She’s pretty chill about this stuff. She was the first one… to know. Now Aunt May and Ned and some of the Avengers know.”

The ducks quacked softly. “Yeah, and I’m gonna tell you guys. Cuz one day I was looking and it really kinda hit me exactly how I felt because people on the internet kept describing it. It’s called, um, it’s called agender… yeah. Like. Not having a gender. Cuz I don’t.”

Peter stopped talking again, but didn’t look up at Steve. Steve tried not to breathe loudly, feeling as if he shouldn’t spoil the fact that the ducks were supposed to be the ones listening, not him.

“I’m just me, you know? Not a guy, not transgender, really, not anything. Just me. Peter Parker. Um. It’s kinda hard to tell people because I’m never really sure if they’re gonna be a dick about it. Or, I’m gonna have to do a lot of explaining and sometimes I just don’t want to. I should just be able to say that I’m not a ‘he,’ I’m a ‘they,’ no, I’m not changing my name, and it’s none of your business what I choose to wear or do with myself, including whether or not I’m wearing mascara! But the fact that you understand mascara says more about you than it does about me, huh!”

Steve got the feeling that the last sentence was directed at a very specific conversation Peter had.

“But now, I guess I’ve… well, I’ve told everyone important. Because I told you.” Suddenly, Peter wasn’t speaking to the ducks anymore, even though they were still staring at them resolutely, uncharacteristically still.

The two of them sat in silence as Steve collected his thoughts.

“Are you still going by Spider-Man?” he asked finally.

“It sounds better than Spider-Person,” Peter said, looking up, their usual grin back in place. “I don’t mind so much.”

“How common is it for people to be not, what did you call it, straight?” Steve asked. “When I was in the army, there were rumors about some people, and because there were very few rumors I always figured that there were very few people.”

“Waaaaay more common now,” Peter said. “There’s this theory—” their voice had risen to its normal excitable levels—“that everyone’s a little gay and some people are just significantly more gay than others. And of course, there’s a lot of different stuff that you can be now. That people know of. They probably didn’t back then.”

“I never really knew you could be attracted to both genders.”

“I am,” Peter said, the admission slipping way more fluidly from their lips than the other. They grinned. “I know a couple people who are. Running theory is MJ’s bisexual too, but she never says. Oh! Mr. Stark is bisexual. I think he was supposed to tell you that, and not me. Sorry. Pretend that I didn’t say that.”

“Is it always… the same? Being attracted to both?”

Peter was grinning big now. “Depends on the person,” they said.

“I… hmm.”

“The ducks will listen to your secrets,” Peter whispered conspiratorially. For some reason, Steve was 100% prepared to take that at face value.

“I wish I had bread for you,” he told the ducks.

Just as Steve was for Peter, Peter was silent as Steve stared at the ducks. They quacked softly.

“I feel like you deserve payment for being counselors.”

The ducks neither agreed nor disagreed. One or two turned to look at him.

“I’ve never really thought about being a different sexuality. But I always felt drawn to the rumors.”

Steve paused, resting his chin in his hand, propping his elbow on his knee. “I know I briefly thought… well.” Although Steve was getting into Duck Therapy, he was conscious of Peter sitting next to him still. Maybe he’d share his life story with the ducks some other day. For right now, he was already saying things aloud that he’d never admitted to himself.

“Maybe I am bisexual.”

A duck in the distance rose out of the water, wings flapping and feet paddling furiously, and launched into the sky. To Steve, it may as well have been fireworks.

“My work here is done,” Peter joked.

“Peter—thanks for this. Good talk today.”

“Sure,” Peter said. “Also, I was betting with myself on your sexuality and I totally, totally called it. My gaydar is impeccable.”

“What’s a… never mind. I can figure that one out.”

Peter laughed and stood. “We should go back to Avengers Tower. Mr. Stark is probably done with his coffee break and wants me back.”

“Can’t keep Tony waiting.” Steve rolled his eyes.

…

“Steve! You’ve returned my slave to me!”

“That’s illegal, Tony.”

“Unpaid helper!”

Steve shook his head.

“Fine. Intern who is paid but not for this particular project. How’d your talk go?”

“Fine,” Steve said. Peter had slipped away. Steve didn’t know where to.

“Did Peter take you to the ducks?”

Steve looked at Tony in surprise.

“They took me to the ducks. I already knew I was bisexual; just didn’t know there was a flag to go with it. You’ve got a really introspective look going on. All,” Tony waved his hand, making a face, trying to indicate Steve’s look, “I-just-got-my-mind-blown-because-a-teenager-told-me-something-I-never-knew-about-myself. Shellshocked by Peter is a good look on you,” Tony sniggered.

“In case you haven’t remembered, bisexuality—” Steve tested the word— “Wasn’t too prominent during my formative years.”

“Wait, are you?”

“Bisexual?”

“Yes.”

“Yes.”

“Fuckin’ knew it,” Tony muttered, and Steve wondered why he was suddenly so sure about the sexuality he’d discovered existed about an hour and a half ago.

“Did everyone know but me?”

“Natasha knew. Clint had his money on flat-out gay. Bruce wasn’t willing to bet.”

“Oh, Jesus. You had a bet?”

“We bet on everything, Rogers. You should know that. Speaking of, you wanna bet when Natasha’s gonna put a pride flag out for Peter?”

“A pride flag out for Peter? That’s oddly specific.”

“She feels protective or something—haven’t you noticed that she has pride flags out in front of her room for everyone she knows?”

“Is that what those are?”

“Cap. Dude. How—”

“I learned about all the flags an hour and a half ago when Peter told me!”

“HI GUYS!” Peter shrieked, swinging back in, sporting their color-updated Spidey suit.

“Hi, kid. How’s that fit?”

“It’s great, Mr. Stark. You see, Mr. America? It’s got the colors!! For my flags!! This one’s for agender and this—” they smacked themselves on the chest—“is for bisexual!”

“Do you think I’d look good in those colors?” Steve wondered aloud.

Tony grinned a wicked grin and said, “I have no clue and also get the hell out of my workshop. Peter, throw him out.”

“Throw…?” they asked uncertainly.

“I’ll save you the trouble. I’m going,” Steve said.

…

“Did you go see the ducks?” Natasha asked by way of greeting.

“Is this some new kind of avengers hazing?” Steve asked. “Did everyone go see the ducks? How do you know I saw the ducks?”

“The ducks?” Bruce asked. “What the hell’re those?”

“You’ll know,” Clint said, and Steve didn’t even know Clint had said two words to Peter.

“You saw the ducks?!” Bruce demanded.

“It was enlightening,” Clint said, nodding.

“Fuckin’ ducks,” Bruce muttered.

Natasha pulled Steve aside, into the doorway to the kitchenette area. “So.”

Steve sighed. “I’m bisexual.”

“That’s what I like to hear, Cap. CLINT! PAY UP, BIRDBRAIN!”

Steve leaned away from her voice. “Jesus, Nat.”

(Faintly, Clint called back, “Pay up on what?”)

“What? What’s the point of having a good gaydar if I can’t cash out?”


	2. Peter is a Magician to Rival Dr. Strange

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter gets people involved

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Christ. Please, everyone reading, ping me if I fucked up poor Peter's pronouns. I tried so hard but habits...

Peter managed to drag Tony out for dinner with the Avengers. This was happening more and more often. Steve had been witness to the persuading process once, and it went something like this:

Peter: “I’m hungry. It’s dinner time. Can we go?”

Tony: “If you want dinner, you should go.”

Peter: “Are you going to work on [project] without me?”

Tony: “Yes.”

Peter: “I’ll stay here then.”

Peter: “I’m hungry though.”

Tony: “Then go eat dinner!!”

Peter: “But I don’t want to leave [project] and you here.”

Tony: “I won’t work on any major stuff while you’re gone.”

Peter: …

Tony: “Fine! I won’t work on it at all while you’re gone.”

Peter: “Then come to dinner with me!”

Tony: “You’re insufferable.” And then Tony and Peter ended up at dinner and everyone was happy.

“Bruce made veggie burgers,” Natasha said as Peter and Tony approached. “Nice suit, kiddo.”

“What? Oh.” Peter looked down on themselves, clearly remembering that they were still wearing the “flag suit,” as Steve was calling it in his mind.

Thor and Loki showed up also. Loki was leaving after dinner, but Thor said he’d stay for one more day before going back to Asgard. Peter seemed to be taking careful note of this information, and Steve wondered if Thor was about to see the ducks.

At any rate, Steve walked back to the ducks after dinner, telling Natasha that he was “going out for coffee” as she was the only one he encountered when he finally made his way out the door. She nodded like “going out for coffee” was an important and worthy adventure.

There was someone else sitting with the ducks.

“Clint?”

Clint turned, looking up. “Steve?”

“I didn’t really expect to see anyone else here.”

“I’m probably here for the same reason you are,” Clint said. “Man, it must be super weird for you. Going from world war-era knowledge of sexuality to modern day-knowledge.”

“Is it just me, or does Peter know way more about this than other people?”

“They’re a kid in the new millennium. I think it’s all kids, not just them.”

“So what did you learn?” Steve sat down next to Clint.

“A lot.”

“Wow.”

“I’m straight. Technically,” Clint said.

“And that’s why you’re here with the ducks…”

“Well, ok—there may be a little more to me than I thought.”

“I didn’t know bisexuality existed until Peter took me on a walk before dinner.”

“And now here you are.”

“Here I am.”

“Good talk,” Clint said, standing and clapping Steve on the shoulder. “I’m probably going to go find Peter and update them.”

“On you being straight, technically?”

Clint rolled his eyes. “I guess you’ll find out eventually, won’t you? Bruce rigged Mario Kart up for eight people on the really big screen, complaining it was a waste of his PhDs the entire time, so we wouldn’t want that to go to waste. Wanna play later?”

“Sure. I’ll walk myself back in a bit.”

“Have fun with the ducks,” Clint said. “Catch.”

Steve caught. It was bread. “Thanks.”

Clint was already out of earshot.

Steve relayed to the ducks several stories of army days. He relayed the things he learned after being woken up again, the day of the Supreme Court legislation, and his feelings on the matter. He told them about the talk Peter and he had before they came see the ducks, because he felt like the ducks deserved to know.

They listened and mostly ate bread.

Steve finally determined that yes, he really did always know he was bisexual, he just didn’t know the term for it, and didn’t feel so weird about the way he’d solidified the fact that he was bisexual just because Tony asked if he was right after he saw the ducks.

He shouldn’t keep Mario Kart waiting, he decided, and walked back to the tower.

…

Thor was baffled by Mario Kart. He was also terrible.

Peter had manipulated the rules so that the team was playing through 16 races. They were five in, and Thor hadn’t yet come better than eighth out of eight.  
Loki had chosen to stick around for the entertainment, but insisted he would leave after Mario Kart. He alternated between spitting insults and advice at Thor in particular. After each race was over, he would spare breath to congratulate the winner, and immediately follow up to Thor, “Why can’t you be more like them?”

Peter shot a red shell into Natasha’s car and made it across the finish line in the few seconds that she couldn’t move.

“How are you doing that?” she demanded. “Get down.”

They were on the ceiling again, of course.

“Peter, get down.”

“There’s no room on the couch!”

Natasha reached up for them, but they shrieked and swung away.

“Don’t break anything, Peter!” Tony shouted as Peter’s reaction took them out of the team’s sight. His momentary distraction gave Steve the chance to slip past him into third. Tony came fourth.

“GodDAMNit Cap!”

Steve shrugged.

Clint wasn’t doing much better than Thor, but as Tony and Steve put down their controllers, they both went sailing off a cliff.

“It’s no wonder it took you so long to get your certificate of flying!” Loki was saying, when Thor interrupted.

“Then YOU join and beat me in this child’s game, brother, if you are so convinced of your superiority!”

Bruce handed Loki the eighth controller, which had been listlessly piloting itself thanks to Jarvis and had just gotten fifth place. Bruce crossed the finish line in sixth, Clint in seventh, and Thor, who was nowhere near the finish line, was forced to stop.

The next race appeared on the screen—the road made from a glittering mess of rainbows. From the way Peter cackled, Steve didn’t think the next race was going to go how Loki expected.

“This is unfair!” Loki shouted as he, too, plummeted to earth. Even Natasha was struggling. Peter, of course, had lapped Thor.

When the race was over and Loki had only managed to beat Thor, he screamed “We shall play again!” and angrily tossed the remote to the couch where it bounced harmlessly.

“Brother, it not the custom here to toss things to the ground,” Thor explained.

“You do not know the efforts I’ve gone to in order to learn about humanity,” Loki sniffed.

Loki beat Clint and Steve on an easier track, which seemed to pacify him.

By the end of the tournament, Bruce had vowed never to modify such a game again. Tony and Steve had resorted to trickery and physical violence in order to beat the other, which made it easy for Loki, Bruce and Clint to beat them. Thor had not managed to finish a single race, but loved the game anyway. Natasha had finally beaten Peter in a few races by shouting “boo!” and watching in amusement as they tumbled from the ceiling, climbed back up, and refused to retaliate out of fear for the Black Widow.

The game over, the Avengers dispersed.

…

Steve was making coffee in the kitchen. The kitchen was U-shaped, with openings at the tips of the U leading into a wide, short hallway that serviced the common areas (massive single common area?) on this level. If one was making coffee in the kitchen, one could conceivably go unnoticed by two persons having a conversation over by the stove, a spot which provided a nice vantage point into everywhere on this floor except the other arm of the kitchen.

In short, Peter and Loki didn’t know Steve was there.

“We can talk here.”

“I only ask—I’m not as familiar with Midgardian custom as you.”

“Aw, Mr. Loki, you know you don’t have to take on our customs.”

“It’s not exactly Asgardian custom either. Could you please—could you please call me Loki?”

“Oh! Of course, uh, Loki. What isn’t Asgardian custom?”

“It’s, it’s the way I am.”

Loki, stuttering?

“You are—what do you call it?”

“Agender.”

So Loki was skipping the duck chat.

Peter’s voice came from higher up. Maybe they’d leapt onto something? It put everyone at ease, somehow, when the spider was hanging so naturally from the ceiling. Peter had quite the talent for cutting through tension and stuffiness. “I don’t judge,” Peter said factually.

Loki didn’t answer. There was a wooshing noise like the air moving around Loki. Perhaps he was creating an illusion. Whatever it was, it went on for several seconds before stopping.

“In Asgard, I would be—insulting myself with this form.”

“Is that how Thor sees it?”

“He has never minded what shape I take, but he has stated he prefers—” Woosh.

“And what do you prefer?”

“It depends on… how I feel,” Loki said.

“Have you ever heard the term genderfluid?”

“I haven’t, nor is there an Asgardian translation. If there are others like me on that planet, they are well hidden,” Loki said bitterly.

Peter clapped once. “I can talk to Thor. I was going to tomorrow, anyway.” Aha!

“Thank you.”

“The rest of the team—they don’t mind me, so they won’t mind you.”

“Have you spoken with them?”

“Most of them.”

“Not all of them.” Loki sounded concerned.

“You don’t have to worry—they’ll understand. I know they will.”

There was a pause.

“Loki, why doesn’t your other form look like that?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean a feminized version of what you are.”

“This isn’t my true form.”

“Can I see?” Peter asked excitedly. The air wooshed. Peter oohed. The air wooshed again.

“This is what I prefer.”

“So just bring out—yeah, change the shape there. Straighten your hair.”

Soft wooshes.

“See, that’s good.”

“Maybe I will return to Asgard like this.”

“I thought you said…?”

“Hela take them,” Loki said dismissively. “I am returning as I am.”

Loki strode out of the kitchen, and unfortunately, past the other open arm. He—She—froze.

“Steve Rogers.”

“I’m sorry,” Steve said, which seemed appropriate.

Loki’s dressy shin-length tunic had become a decorated, shapely floor-length dress. A wide, flat gold necklace laid over the relatively high neckline of the dress. Her straightened hair spilled loosely over the shoulders of the dress. Gone were the showy shoulder pads, but the golden vambraces merely had designs etched into them, like functional bracelets.

Her voice was just slightly higher.

“It is very rude to listen in to conversation.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Peter snorted with laughter. Steve had forgotten the kid was there. Well, they could laugh all they wanted—Steve was raised to treat ladies with respect.

It seemed to pacify her, at least, and she said, “So perhaps you gathered the nature of…”

“Her identity?” Peter cut in.

“Should we still call you Loki?” Steve asked.

“I will always be Loki.” She sniffed haughtily. “Simply not always male.”

Peter cut a hard glance toward Steve. Steve shrugged. He caught up with smartphones, SHEILD’s flying aircraft carrier, and even (to Peter’s unending delight) some memes. Switching genders wasn’t even the weirdest acceptable thing in this new era.

“Thank you, Peter,” Loki said, and stepped out onto the balcony, where the bifrost immediately carried her away.

“You’re going to have to start an advice column,” Steve said.

“A what?” Peter asked.

Steve groaned. “Do those exist anymore?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> five more chapters to go!


	3. The Chapter in Which Misunderstandings Happen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve is way too invested now, and is Peter's new other dad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is where the misunderstanding happens, but it turns out fine, I promise!

Steve observed Peter bound up to Thor and latch on to his arm. “Hi.”

“Hello, Man of Spiders.”

“Can we talk?” Peter asked. They tugged Thor away from Steve’s vision. Steve was very tempted to follow, but refrained.

Steve puttered around in the living room, most definitely not waiting for Thor and Peter to come back from the duck chat. He finally settled himself down for a book.

To his shock, Thor and Peter’s return was not announced by the amicable chatting that Steve had expected, but Peter swinging full force through the open window and slamming into the couch. Moments later, Thor came jogging up, looking baffled and concerned.

“Peter?” Steve asked.

Peter untangled themselves from the pillows and popped their head up to see Thor. Casting a look of betrayal and panic, they scurried from the room.

Steve stood to face Thor immediately. He was lucky that his height and build put him on equal standing with the Asgardian, because he intended to look threatening.

“Thor.”

“Friend Steve. Peter has run in here…”

“Looks like you scared them,” Steve drawled. “What’s goin’ on?”

“I don’t understand,” Thor said apologetically. “When I complimented the Man of Spiders, he yelled at me and ran from me.”

“Why don’t you and I have a chat outside?” Steve suggested. He wanted to give Peter their space, at least, and if Thor turned out to be a bigot, then the expensive vases wouldn’t be in danger as Steve pummeled him.

Once outside, Thor turned to Steve again. “Young Peter led me to a duck pond. He then explained that he did not feel masculine. I took it upon myself to reassure the boy that he is very masculine, and I would be proud to call him Man of Spiders.”

Oh, boy.

Well, Steve would work his way up through this conversation.

“Did Peter tell you about the bisexuality?”

“Oh yes! I, myself, am an admirer of men and women. On Asgard, I am even known as a champion of the strong women who love the women of Asgard.” Thor grinned. “Peter has given me the title _Lessbineycon._ ”

Lesbian icon. Steve pressed fingers to where he could feel a headache forming.

“And when Peter expressed his doubts—”

“They aren’t doubts,” said Steve.

“But surely, if a young man does not feel he is masculine enough—”

“Is that how it is on Asgard?”

Thor nodded. “Often, a woman is praised for fighting like a man. It is an honor.”

“In Midgard, it’s not the same,” Steve said.

Thor gave Steve a critical look. “Your people improved you by increasing your strength and build. Surely this is an example of how important masculinity is?”

Well. Steve couldn’t deny that Thor had him there.

“That was for wartime.”

“A noble cause!”

“ _No._ ”

Thor seemed to subdue.

“Here on Midgard, we don’t like laying down unnecessary lives.”

“It is your custom,” Thor acknowledged.

“We also do not believe that a person has to be masculine to be… worth something.”

“So Midgard does _not_ admire masculinity?” Thor asked.

“No. Peter isn’t having any doubts. They simply would rather be neither masculine nor feminine.”

“Why did you use the word ‘they’?”

“Because they don’t like being called ‘he’.”

“I am beginning to understand,” Thor said softly. “May I go in and make my apologies to Peter?”

“Let me go in first,” Steve said, but offered the first slight quirk of a smile since the start of this conversation.

…

“Peter.”

The door to the bedroom was locked.

“Can you open up, please?”

Steve picked up the sound of heavy breathing on the other side of the door. So Peter was not handling this well.

“It’s just me,” Steve said. “Please unlock the door?”

There was a wet _smik_ and then the handle gave at Steve’s insistence. As he opened it, web fluid dribbled off the flimsy lock.

“Aw, Peter,” Steve said, looking at the curled up kid in the middle of the bed. “What’s wrong?”

“I, I, I tricked myself into believing that” and here they took a shuddering breath “that everyone would be okay with me but they _aren’t_ ! I bet now that I told them about me they’re all gonna… gonna make me go away. _And_ Loki is all alone on a planet that” another hitch “hates her too. And even her, her brother.”

“First of all, I support you,” said Steve. “And Tony supports you. He made you the suit.”

“Yeah,” Peter agreed quietly, after a minute.

“Everyone you’ve already told… they all support you.”

“Thor—” hiccupped Peter.

“I just had a talk with Thor. There was a little custom misunderstanding. He wants to apologize to you.”

“He’s, he’s, he’s okay now?”

“Yes.”

Peter brightened at that, and began to dab at their eyes with the back of their hand.

When Peter stepped out of the room, Thor looked humbled.

“Peter, please forgive me. I did not intend to demean your identity.”

“S’all right,” Peter said. “Can I explain it properly this time around?”

“Of course!” Thor said, sitting down and looking up attentively.

“I’m agender which means I don’t feel like I have any gender.”

“So if you do not wish to be called _Man_ of Spiders—”

“People will keep calling me Spiderman; I can’t change that. Just, my pronouns are ‘they’ and ‘them’ and… yeah.”

Thor appeared to be making a visible effort to parse this. Considering that he was probably further behind in the Earth terms for gender and sexuality than Steve was before the ducks, he was probably allowed a little confusion.

“Thank you for taking me into your confidence, Peter,” Thor said.

“I—well. Everyone knows, or everyone will, y’know, eventually. But. Um. I actually had to talk to you about something—someone—else.”

“Who?”

“Loki.”

“What has he done?” Thor asked. Steve laughed.

“He hasn’t done anything yet,” Steve cut in.

“He also is, um, we call it genderfluid. Sometimes, people would rather be female or feminine, and sometimes they’d rather be male…”

“Loki has never told me this,” Thor mused.

“I’m not surprised,” Steve said. “If how you reacted to Peter’s declaration was any indication…”

“I truly am sorry.”

“I believe you,” Peter said. “Just, if you see Loki in a dress…”

“Then I shall treat her as my sister,” Thor said.

“Yeah.” Peter nodded, brightness coming back to their eyes. “Exactly.”

…

Peter was asleep on the couch.

Tony spotted Steve and walked in, mouth open to call out. Steve shushed him.

“We had an interesting day,” Steve said.

“We?”

“I was there when Peter talked to Loki and then got in an argument with Thor…”

“With Thor?” Tony’s eyes were darting around the room. Maybe he was searching out the god of thunder.

“It ended up being a misunderstanding,” Steve explained.

“Can you move them to their bed?” Tony asked.

Steve scooped Peter up and carried them to their room.

Once Steve re-emerged, Tony immediately asked, “So what happened with Loki and Thor?”

“Loki’s genderfluid.”

“Who knows?”

“Well… Peter and I. And you. And Thor, now. Turns out that Asgardians have the… what does Peter call it? Heteronormativity?”

“Sure.”

“Of the 1940’s. That’s not right. What’s a word for thinking that being masculine is the best thing?”

“Toxic masculinity?” Tony guessed. Steve shrugged. “I get the picture,” Tony said.

“Thor thought Peter needed encouragement, not acceptance. Peter thought Thor was going to hate them for who they were. I found out when the two of them came running in here and Peter disappeared into their room.”

“Please tell me that you got Thor to understand.”

“I did, and Peter talked to him. It just ended being an emotionally taxing day for Peter.”

Tony cast a sympathetic look to Peter’s door.

“Is Thor straight?” Tony asked.

“No?” Steve replied, shocked by the sudden change of topic.

“Fuck.”

“Really?”

“I had a bet with Nat.”

_“Really?”_

“I know. I shouldn’t. But I do anyway.”

“What did she just win?”

Tony shook his head. “She gets to do my makeup.”

“That’s not bad.”

“For a press conference.”

“Oh.” Steve laughed. “I can’t wait!”

…

“Bi,” Peter told Tony. “Cis.”

“I brought you coffee,” Steve announced. “Again.”

“Thank you, Mr. America.” Peter was back in civilian clothes, and thankfully, they did not slam into Steve and cause a repeat of yesterday.

“Do I get to see what you’re working on?”

“Absolutely not,” Tony said. “Thank you very much; get out.”

He walked up to Steve and plucked the coffees from his hands, handing them to Peter. Then he began pushing the super soldier out the door.

“I hope you realize how futile this is,” Steve said, already backing out the door. “If I really wanted to hold my ground—”

Tony pulled a hand away and straightened up. He shrugged.

Steve turned to go, and felt his bicep being squished as he left. Peter was giggling.

…

“I heard you’re doing Tony’s makeup for the next press conference.”

Natasha grinned, moving smoothly into her next stretch. Steve attempted to follow, but felt the pain of the stretch immediately.

“So Thor’s bi?”

“What was the actual bet?”

“Tony said straight, I said bi or pansexual. Bruce said gay, but I think that was more for the sake of betting against us.”

“Bruce bet against you?”

“I was surprised too.” Nat stood and ran for the pull-up bar. She leapt, grabbing it with both hands, and swung out. She flipped when she let go and landed on her feet next to the mat they used for hand-to-hand practice.

“Showoff,” Steve muttered.

“Come fight me, Rogers.”

Steve complied. “Are there any ongoing bets?”

“Yeah. Bruce.”

“Are there any ongoing bets about anything other than people’s sexualities?”

Natasha shook her head, ducking around Steve. He spun and crouched lower, hands up to defend himself from the blow.

“Has anyone made a bet about Loki?”

“Loki?” Natasha asked, straightening and letting her hands fall. Steve took the opportunity to try to land a punch, but she dodged and returned the blow quicker than Steve could blink.

“You do that on purpose,” he complained.

“Would I be the Black Widow if I didn’t?” Natasha asked rhetorically.

“Loki. You know, the one who tried to take over New…” Steve broke off to trade a few punches with Natasha. “New York,” he finished.

“Do you want to start one?” Natasha asked.

“Sure.”

Natasha considered. “Prefers not to define his sexuality. But he’s gay.”

“That’s oddly specific.”

“I’ve gotten very good at this.” She stopped talking and started to fight Steve in earnest. Although if he got a solid lock on her, he could immobilize her just by holding on, she was quick—almost quicker in small spaces than Steve himself—and considerably better trained. She knew how to read his motions, and that was something he might _never_ be able to beat.

Steve got two hands on Natasha at the same time and used the split-second opportunity to shove her powerfully away from him and onto the ground. A childish move, maybe, but it did put him at the advantage.

Natasha rolled gracefully and was back on her feet immediately. She was wary about coming closer to Steve while he was completely prepared for her.

“What are you going to bet?” she asked instead. “On Loki or Bruce?”

“What did you bet on Bruce?”

“Gay.”

“Straight, then.”

“What are you betting?”

“What do you want me to bet?”

“I’d like you to bet your own cooking for the Avengers… for every day in a month.”

“Two weeks.”

“Two weeks, okay,” Natasha agreed, knowing how hard it was to feed multiple people with supernaturally high metabolisms. “And Loki?”

“Loki will show up to Avengers tower in a dress.”

Natasha laughed. “Now who’s being specific?”

“What will you concede?”

“ _If_ Loki shows up in a dress…” Nat dodged in and struck a few times, but Steve defended easily. She appeared to be lost in thought.

“You’ll wear a pink dress next time we have to do a social event. I get to pick it.”

“I get veto on grounds of mobility,” Natasha said.

“That’s fine,” Steve said. He grabbed Natasha’s arm, but she did some sort of flip over him, using his body as a springboard, and put his wrist in an uncomfortable position. He let go.

“If you lose, the cooking extends by another two weeks,” Natasha warned.

“You could just say you like my cooking.”

Natasha shrugged. “I could.”

“Hey, Nat. What’s your…”

“Demisexual. Demiromantic. Straight.” Before Steve could say anything, she said, “Just ask Peter. They explain it better than me.”

“So you learned about it on the duck visit?”

“And if I did?” Natasha asked, flipping Steve onto the floor.

…

“And prozils?” Peter asked.

“What?”

“Pretzels,” Tony said. “We have pretzel sticks in the cabinet somewhere.”

“Sure, I’ll go get you pretzels.” Steve didn’t know when he’d become Tony and Peter’s personal errand boy, but now the job seemed to default to him no matter what.

He walked away to the kitchen. Scott and Hope were here on a brief visit. Steve privately thought that the way they were looking at each other, there was certainly no need for a duck visit from them, and then he wondered when Peter’s duck agenda had become everyone’s first thought.

There was something going on, he reasoned, and it had to do with the suits Tony had in the shop, including the green one Peter had on the other day.

Steve walked back to the shop, carrying the bag of pretzels. “Peter? Tony?”

“Hey, Cap! Come on back.”

Steve entered the shop.

“Mr. Stark? I think I figured it out.” Peter was looking at their arm, walking towards Steve. “It happens if I press here.” They punched the inside of their wrist, and web fluid shot out.

“There’s probably some part that’s hitting the trigger,” Tony reasoned.

“I got your pretzels,” Steve announced. “Is this going to be a regular occurrence?”

His arm had been webbed to his chest.

“Oh my gosh! I’m so sorry, Mr. America!”

“It’s okay. How long until it dissolves?”

“Two hours,” Peter said. “You could try to break it…”

Steve strained against the web, to no avail.He went to grab it with his other hand, but Peter shouted.

“It’s sticky! Don’t touch!”

“That’s unfortunate,” Tony said, plucking the pretzels from the hand glued to Steve’s chest. “At least you didn’t shoot the pretzels, kiddo.”

“How’s your project going?”

“Really well!” Peter enthused. “We’re almost finished with everyone wh…” they fell silent after catching Tony’s eye.

“I’ll leave you alone before Peter actually says any secrets,” Steve said, and left.

…

Dr. Strange chose that precise hour to visit the Avengers tower, and started the visit by staring critically at Steve.

Steve shrugged helplessly with one shoulder and tried to think of something to say that didn’t make himself, Tony, or Peter look like idiots. He’d be able to play this off with anyone else, but Dr. Strange was an unknown—and he moved solely by portalling or floating. Just slightly intimidating.

“I’ve come to talk with Ms. Pepper Potts,” Dr. Strange said.

“She’s in her office,” Steve replied. In addition to running Tony’s company, Pepper managed PR for the Avengers. Steve didn’t know the official reason she and Tony had broken up, but it could be because she deserved a relationship with someone other than Tony for all the time she had to spend with him.

The sorcerer followed Steve up to the PR office in the Avengers tower. When they entered, however, it was Steve that Pepper immediately started fussing at.

“This was careless…” she muttered, inspecting the webbing while being careful not to touch it.

“They haven’t webbed anything important,” Steve said. “It’ll go away in another hour.”

“They haven’t webbed anything important _yet_.”

“Tony’s helping Peter fix it, anyway.”

Pepper made a face and sent Steve from the room.

…

“Pepper fussed at me,” Steve complained to Tony, walking back into the lab. As loath as he was to do anything for fear he’d stick, Steve had nowhere else to be.

“Why’d you go see her then?” Tony asked around a mouthful of pins.

“Dr. Strange was here.”

“ _Dr. Strange_ was here?” Peter demanded. “Mr. Stark, can I go?”

“You don’t have to ask,” Tony replied, amused, and Peter shot out of the room.

“So what are they doing?”

Tony shrugged deliberately, and turned to face Steve. “So it’s just you and me,” he said.

“Cute.”

“Am I? I was going for suave…”

Steve sat down on one of the stools in the lab, and made yet another effort to break the web. “This is… incredibly strong.”

“I’m so proud of Peter,” Tony said. “Don’t tell Banner, but organic chemistry is certainly not my best subject.”

“Why?”

“It’s so hard to… troubleshoot. I can never wrap my mind around why things are happening. Every time I get a handle on it…” Tony made a woosh noise and opened his hand.

“No, I meant why not tell Bruce?”

“He’d make fun of me,” Tony complained. “It doesn’t matter that I’ve surpassed every competitor in every aspect of technology. I don’t have as many PhDs as him.”

“He had too much time on his hands,” Steve said soothingly. “You could have gotten seven PhDs too.”

“I could have,” Tony said. “I still could. But that would involve writing.”

Considering Tony’s disastrous handwriting, Steve personally thought that Tony’s departure from school was only good for him.

“Don’t get your hand stuck,” Steve said, as Tony reached in to inspect the webbing.

“When did Peter web you?”

“An hour and a half ago, why?”

“I expected deterioration. Try to move again?”

Steve did, and felt a creaking, as if the webbing was thinking about letting go, but Steve was still unable to move. “There’s some amount of deterioration,” Steve said.

“Hmm.”

“Hey—did Peter tell you about Loki?”

“What about Loki?” Tony asked, grabbing a sheaf of drawings off the table.

“I guess he hasn’t,” Steve said instead. “Natasha has a bet.”

“Ooh, boy.” Tony put the stack down to clap his hands together. “Tell me.”

“Nat says ‘prefers not to define sexuality, but is gay’ and I said—”

“You’re betting??”

“Yeah, and if I lose, I could face a month of cooking dinner!” Steve exclaimed.

“Harsh. Continue.”

“I said Loki would show up in a dress.”

Tony shook his head. “Are you crazy or stupid?”

“We’ll find out, I suppose,” Steve said, although personally he thought he was being crafty.

“Okay. I say that he’s into polyamory.”

“That’s… what is that? Orgies?”

Tony laughed and clapped Steve on the shoulder. “Steve. _Steve._ I cannot believe I just heard the word ‘orgies’ from your mouth.”

“Congratulations,” Steve said.

“What?” Tony asked, but then caught sight of the webbing under his hand. “Fuck.”

…

Peter bounced back into the room within the half-hour, which meant that Steve and Tony were still stuck when they arrived.

“Peter, what’s polyamory?” Steve asked, as soon as the young avenger entered.

They stopped, and stared at Steve and Tony for a moment. Steve could practically see the thoughts whizzing through Peter’s head as they tried to rationalize Steve and Tony’s current predicament with Steve’s question.

“It’s when people have relationships with multiple other people,” Peter answered finally, hesitantly. “Are you okay?”

“Annoyed, mostly,” Steve said, walking to the left in response to Tony’s incessant tugging. Steve had nowhere to be, which was lucky, because Tony seemed to think he had work to do and was busy dragging Steve everywhere he needed to go.

“Why haven’t we worked out an emergency web dissolution formula yet?” Tony asked.

“I have one, actually,” Peter said, “But it turns the web boiling hot and melts it, so it would burn you pretty badly.”

“It might be worth it,” Tony said without much seriousness, dragging Steve over another foot.

“I feel it slipping!” Steve announced suddenly, and wrenched his arm away from his body with enough force to send Tony tumbling away. “Sorry, Tony.”

“Nothing you haven’t done before,” Tony said. “Help me up?”

He offered a hand still coated in sticky web.

“No.”

“Rude,” Tony said, and levered himself up with only his left hand.

The webbing dropped away from his hand five minutes later, at which point Tony kicked Steve out, saying he had important work to get back to.

…

“What is Mr. Stark working on?” Dr. Strange asked, hovering towards Steve.

“We’re not allowed to know,” Steve said. “Did you have the duck talk?”

“The duck…? Peter took me to see a duck pond, is that what you are talking about?”

“They’ve been doing that to everyone steadily over the course of about two weeks,” Steve said.

“I see,” Dr. Strange said. “If I portalled into Mr. Stark’s workroom, how would my presence be met?”

“Badly,” Steve said honestly. “Would you like to stay for dinner?”

“I suppose,” Dr. Strange agreed. “How does dinner happen with the Avengers?”

“It’s my turn to cook,” Steve said.

“I’ll help,” Dr. Strange offered.

…

Pepper walked downstairs and encountered Steve calmly chopping garlic amid a flurry of golden light. Dr. Strange’s help was largely hands-off, but the magical sendings were easily performing tasks like rolling pasta dough and washing vegetables.

She wasn’t fazed for long, and greeted them with “Steve—Stephen” before she left.

Tony, on the other hand, walked in and immediately turned around and walked out without a word.

Dr. Strange, from his sedentary floating position in the corner, watched him exit with raised eyebrow.

“Don’t mind him,” Steve said. “He’s like that sometimes.”

They served pasta—or Dr. Strange’s golden hands served pasta, all at once. Peter insisted on sitting between Steve and the sorcerer and pummeled him with questions about magic. When Peter finally figured out that Dr. Strange had no inherent magical ability and it might be something Peter could learn to do, Peter whipped around in their seat to stare at Tony in excitement. Tony glared in response.

“Absolutely not.”

Peter crumpled.

“You already have superpowers,” Steve pointed out.

“But I wanna do the boom boom woosh!” Peter said, miming their words.

“It takes an intense amount of patience and discipline,” Dr. Strange said. “Your superpowers speed your actions. That might make it impossible for you to learn, unfortunately. On the other hand, there is no way for me to go swinging through the streets of New York lifting boulders larger than myself with my bare hands.”

Pepper looked impressed. Peter seemed contented.

…

Dr. Strange was sitting on something real, for once. The Cloak of Levitation was having a stare-down with Peter.

“It likes you,” Dr. Strange said.

“Hey,” Steve said, walking into the room. “Tony wants to know if you’re staying a while.”

“I’m sorry. I can get going.” Dr. Strange stood, hand out, preparing to cast a portal.

“No, wait! Dr. Strange! He’s asking if you want the room we have for you here.”

Steve took several rushed steps toward the doctor.

Dr. Strange lowered his hand slowly. “Call me Stephen, please.”

“Stephen,” Steve said. “You’re welcome to stay.”

“Thank you.” The Cloak of Levitation draped itself on Stephen’s shoulders. “However, I have to check on the Sanctum, so I’ll return there at night. I’ll... be sure to visit.”

From elsewhere in the compound, Natasha yelled, “PETER!”

Peter shrugged and zipped away.

“You changed the conversation pretty quickly when we talked about the duck pond,” Steve noticed as soon as Peter was out of earshot.

“Did I?” Stephen asked.

“I would never judge you—I’m just curious.”

“Why?”

“Wouldn’t you be?”

Stephen stayed impassive.

“I learned what bisexuality was for the first time when Peter took me to the pond,” Steve offered.

“Right... you were born in time to fight in World War II. Much different time period.”

“I used to think I might be a... well, we didn’t call it ‘gay’ then.”

“Something for someone you knew?” Stephen asked.

Stephen’s words jolted a few memories loose, because he was _right,_ but Steve cast his eyes to the floor only long enough to collect himself and continue the conversation.

“Yeah. Back then, the only proper reaction was, well. Fear.”

“You’re not afraid anymore.”

“We’re lucky. I’m old--” and here, Steve grinned, “so I know a few things, like that we are very lucky people to be here among these people in this place in this time.”

“I can’t imagine...”

“Be glad you don’t have to. We’re lucky, okay; we have to understand that.”

“I’m used to having the most knowledge in the room,” Stephen said, “but you’ve outdone me in experience.”

“How does it feel?”

“Humbling,” Stephen admitted.

“Good.” Steve put his hand on Stephen’s shoulder. “You at least told Peter, right?”

“We’ve switched topics again? You’re giving me whiplash, Captain.”

“No, I’m not.”

Stephen had certainly been avoiding Steve’s questions, but he finally answered.

“Yes, I told Peter. They’re easy to talk to.”

“When you feel ready, you have a kind audience in myself and the team.”

“I know that.”

From elsewhere in the compound, Pepper was yelling for Steve.

“It looks like I have to go,” Steve said regretfully. “See you tomorrow?”

“You might. I’m going to say my farewells before I go, and thank Tony.”

Steve and Stephen stood and parted ways, and Steve wondered if he was imagining the fact that Stephen held himself... lighter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *sings* four more left to gooooo


	4. Everyone Finds Out Who's Better Than Them at Technology

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stephen Strange!

“Steve! There you are.”

“Hello, Pepper.”

“I don’t think I talked to you about the calendar yet.”

“You did not,” Steve confirmed.

“I made a team for us here--” she showed Steve on her tablet-- “and it’s called The Avengers, see?”

Steve grinned at that.

“I’m adding a bunch of events that we’re supposed to attend, and who’s attending them. Here, it says what everyone’s expected to do. You just have to keep tabs on this, and not schedule anything on a day that conflicts.”

“Sure, I can do that. Show me how to use this?”

One short explanation later, Steve was acquainted with the calendar system and easily using it. He distinctly heard Pepper mutter something about how Steve, who was born before-- well, most modern technology, was picking things up faster than _some forty-year-olds who acted like they were allergic to technology_. Steve suspected Clint.

“Hey, what’s this?”

June 29-30 was marked off as an all-team event (no excuses), without any explanation.

“Oh.” Pepper smiled. “You’ll find out, and so will everyone else, in due time, okay?”

...

“Capsicle!”

Steve was sure that Tony’s excitement stemmed mostly from his knowledge that Steve was bearing coffee, but a guy could hope, he supposed. Tony walked over to pluck the drinks from his hands, but drew back in surprise when he saw there were three on a tray.

“I wanted coffee,” Steve explained, “and thought I’d stay long enough to drink it. To see how you guys are doing.”

Peter bounded over, holding a teetering pile of colored fabric.

“We’re doing great!”

“Glad to hear it,” Steve said. “Is there anyone more you need to talk to, Peter?”

“I just-- hey, how’d you know?”

Steve shrugged. “It was getting fairly obvious. Don’t worry; I have absolutely no idea what your end goal is.”

“Good,” Tony said. “There’s some people who we don’t know if they’re coming, or they haven’t dropped by since we started.”

“And, um, I haven’t talked to Dr. Banner yet.”

“Why not?” Tony asked, turning to look at Peter.

“Because he’s very smart and he probably doesn’t want me bothering him,” Peter said in a small voice. “He’s like a professor.”

“He played Mario Kart with you!” Tony said with some amount of disbelief.

Peter shrugged.

“I’ll go with you,” Steve offered.

“Now?”

“Why not?”

Peter dumped the fabric into Tony’s arms. “We can go now,” they decided.

“And just leave me with all this? Teenage hooligan!”

Peter dragged Steve out of the room, and though Steve went willingly, he thought back to when Tony asked Peter to throw Steve out-- if Steve didn’t fight back, Peter _could_ probably throw him out.

“Where’s Dr. Banner?” Peter asked.

“In his lab, I’d imagine,” Steve said. Bruce had been working for a while on some theory about how memories were processed in the brain.

Peter followed Steve downstairs to the lab that Tony had designed for Bruce. Almost immediately upon entering, they were hooked. Steve didn’t know anything about the tools Peter was pointing to and naming, nor did he know anything about the experiments Peter was referring to, but he could tell that the kid knew a lot about chemistry.

Further back in the lab, the instruments became more attuned to human biology and Peter had less answers and more questions.

“...and is that an MRI machine? How does it work?”

“If I tried to use an MRI machine in here, I’d summon every bit of metal in the lab, and that would be... messy,” came a voice from the shadows.

“Dr. Banner!”

“Mr. Parker.”

Steve saw Peter’s tell, the way they looked uncomfortably off to the side at the honorific, but only because he was looking.

“What brings you down here?” Bruce asked, addressing Steve.

“I have nothing to do with this,” Steve said. “I don’t even know what’s going on.”

“Ah. Peter, what’s going on?”

“We’re working on a project,” Peter said. “Wait. No. That’s not why I’m down here.”

Bruce waited quietly, but raised his eyebrows.

“The project is separate. Well, this is related--”

“Peter...” Steve said softly, hoping to jolt them from their increasingly awkward speech.

“Sorry! Okay, um, can we... talk?”

“Sure,” Bruce said, sounding mildly intrigued.

“We could, um, go walk somewhere.”

Behind Peter’s back, Steve gestured that Bruce should go along with it. Bruce caught his eye and silently agreed.

“Sure, where do you want to go?” Bruce asked, putting down the tools in his hands.

...

Unlike the talk with Thor, Peter’s return with Bruce was triumphant. They were deep into some conversation about chemistry that had Steve lost within a sentence, Peter was grinning widely, and Bruce even had a small smile on his face.

“So, the ducks, huh,” Bruce mused later, leaning on the counter beside Steve with arms crossed.

“I learned the word bisexual and told Tony I was bisexual the same day,” Steve said.

Bruce nodded. “I’ve... well. The gay part wasn’t that hard to figure out.”

Steve was immediately disappointed. Looks like he’d be cooking for two weeks.

“But there was another word they told me... grey-sexual, they called it?”

“What’s that? I didn’t hear that one.”

“It’s on the spectrum of asexuality, which--”

“Of what?” Steve stepped away to turn and face Bruce. “This is new.”

“Asexuality... not having sexual attraction? Ugh. I don’t like explaining this, you know. You should ask Peter.”

Bruce really did look uncomfortable with it, so Steve dropped the topic and resolved to ask Peter later.

“Oh, by the way, I’m cooking for the next two weeks. Any requests?”

“What bet did you lose?”

“I bet against Nat that you were straight,” Steve admitted.

Bruce shook his head and buried his face in his hands. “I’m going to kill her,” he said calmly.

“You’d probably have to get in line,” Steve said.

Bruce raised his head and gave Steve a hard look for a minute before finally saying, “I can’t believe there was anyone left on the team who thought I was straight.”

“In my defense, you haven’t expressed interest in anyone, ever! At least, not to me.”

Bruce rolled his eyes.

...

The next day found Tony sitting petulantly on the couch when Steve came in from his morning run with coffees.

“What happened here?”

“Peter kicked me out,” Tony complained. “They wanted to work in _Banner’s_ lab.”

“Remind me, which one of you is an adult and which is a teenager?”

“Bite me.”

“Absolutely not.”

Tony stood and took the coffee from Steve. “Peter’s gonna want their coffee, but you’ll have to take it to Banner’s lab.”

“I thought he was Bruce. Are you back to last names?”

“He stole my intern!”

Steve laughed. “You could at least come with me to Bruce’s lab.”

“Sure.” Tony fell into step beside Steve and they took the elevator down to Bruce’s lab.

“How’s it going?” Steve called, entering the depths of the lab.

“Careful!” Bruce yelled back. “Don’t bump into anything!”

There were various projects strewn around-- many things being gently heated, and a few in odd machines.

“Where are you?” Tony asked, moving further forward.

Peter ran out, covered in white scrubs. “Mr. Staaark, I’m gonna have to change again,” they complained.

“Hello there,” Steve said. “Do you want coffee?”

“Yes!” Peter snatched the mug from Steve and took a gulp. “We’re working in a clean room, so Dr. Banner can’t come out right now.”

“Still that memory project?”

“Yeah. It can get contaminated if it’s exposed to other biologies or something, I don’t really know.”

"How long are you gonna be here?"

Peter shrugged. "All day?"

"How many days?"

"Until l get bored," Peter answered honestly.

"Just remember that we have a deadline," Tony warned.

"Is it June 29?" Steve asked, feeling like he was starting to piece together more information.

Peter gave Steve a look like they’d been caught with their hand in a cookie jar. “No,” they said, distinctly unconvincingly.

“How did you know?” Tony asked.

“Pepper’s got that day blocked off for all Avengers with no description,” Steve explained.

“Well, that’s all right, then,” Tony said.

There was the sound of a ringing timer from the depths of the lab. “It’s done!” Bruce shouted.

“I’ll be there in a second!” Peter yelled back.

“We’ll leave you to it. Good work,” Steve said. “C’mon, Tony.”

Tony offered his arm, so Steve rolled his eyes and took it. Tony led him out of the lab.

“So now that your plans for the day have been ruined, what next?”

“Oh, there’s always another project,” Tony said.

“Or, we could go out. You know, for fun.”

“You and me? I’m flattered--”

“Hey.” Steve smacked Tony’s shoulder. “What I _meant_ was that we could ask Nat and Clint and Stephen along too, but if you wanna go on a date, I’d consider humoring you, but only because I’m polite...”

“Stephen?”

“Yeah, he said he’d drop by later today and be sociable.”

“Hmm.” Tony looked down at his shirt-- Black Sabbath, with a hole for the arc reactor. He fiddled with the fabric around the reactor for a moment. “I suppose we could find something to do. Ah! We should go _bowling._ ”

“In that case, we should not invite Clint.”

“He can sit there and laugh at us, I guess.”

“He could. Speaking of laughing at you, when’s our next press conference?”

“I don’t know, Cap, you think I keep track of these things?”

“We could-- hey, FRIDAY!”

“Yes, Steve?” came the feminine voice from the ceiling.

“Can you show me the calendar for this month?”

“Steve, I don’t have a screen right now,” FRIDAY said, and Steve could swear she sounded exasperated.

“Put it up on the TV in room 37,” Tony said, and the room they immediately entered had the calendar on it.

“You remember the number of every room?”

“Sure.”

“Press conference-- the week before the mysterious event.”

Tony groaned.

“You made your bet, now lie in it,” said Steve, who was immediately impressed with his wordplay.

“I might do something unprecedented,” Tony said, “and actually beg Nat to change the bet.”

“Tony, no.”

“This press conference-- for once in my life-- is actually important to me, and me going up in makeup will not exactly help what I have to say.”

Steve shrugged. “You can talk to her, but she doesn’t have to listen.”

“I know...”

The clock on the bottom of the screen turned from 9:59 to 10:00, and the soft sounds of a portal came from behind the two men.

“Stephen!” Tony said. “Did you feel a disturbance in the force? We were talking about you.”

“Tony, they aren’t even wizards,” Stephen said in exasperation.

“Okay-- fine. Extendable ears?”

Stephen gave a blank look.

“You know, from Harry Potter?”

“You’re incorrigible.”

Tony shook his head. “Do you want to go bowling?”

“Bowling?”

“Bruce and Peter are working and Tony’s lonely,” Steve explained. “Where’s Natasha and Clint?”

Clint was already striding towards them. “Nat’s out on a mission.”

“A real mission?”

“Yeah. What’s this I hear about bowling?”

“We’re going bowling; wanna come?”

“I mean, sure. Is there anyone else coming?”

“Thor and Loki are in Asgard, Scott and Hope are with Pym, Rhodey and Sam have jobs...”

“So, no.”

“All right. Who’s driving?”

“Driving? Tony, I can make magic portals!”

Tony laughed. “Are we ready to go?”

“Sure,” Steve and Clint said.

Stephen opened the portal, leaving them just out of view of the front entrance of the alley.

“Quick thinking,” Tony praised. “Portalling right in would have been a little suspicious, huh?”

“I’ve learned my lessons,” Stephen said cryptically.

They set up for bowling, and after a brief discussion, decided not to form teams-- as Clint was certainly too good to do anything but skew the competition.

“Are you sure you’re not superpowered?” Stephen asked.

“Nope-- just fantastic training,” Clint replied.

Clint led with a strike, and Tony and Steve followed with fairly average scores. When Stephen went to pick up the ball, his hands were wreathed in yellow light.

“No cheating!” Tony admonished, plucking the ball from Stephen’s hands to reveal the magic.

“I’m not cheating!”

Tony waved his hand above Stephen’s as if he could dispel the magic. “What do you call this, then?”

The magic dropped.

Though Steve was watching from a little ways away, he could see the tremor in Stephen’s hands.

“I don’t cheat,” Stephen said, as the magic swirled over his left hand, steadying it.

Tony seemed to be at a loss for words. If there had been a joke to make about the situation, he would have made it, but he said nothing.

Stephen’s score was also mundane.

The rest of the game passed without much fuss. Clint was persuaded to roll badly on a few shots so they wouldn’t have to deal with the deal the bowling alley would make about a perfect 300, and Steve got second place to Clint, although he was pretty close in score to Tony and Stephen.

“Lunch?” Steve suggested when they were done.

Tony rolled his eyes. “You’re always hungry.”

“I have a super-paced metabolism,” Steve pointed out.

“I could go for some lunch,” Clint said. “Italian?”

“I know a place,” Stephen said, portalling them away.


	5. Gossip from the 1930’s to Today

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone thinks Steve was more openly gay in the 30's than he really was.

“Y’know,” Tony started. They were back at the compound. Stephen had taken off, claiming wizard duties, and Clint had vanished away. “Stephen is a lot more talkative now.”

“He’s warmed up to us, I guess,” Steve said. 

“Maybe. Hey-- would it be worse to have to wear gloves all the time, or to have your hands shake?”

“You’re already trying to make tech for him? Is it love?”

“I make tech for  _ you,  _ so clearly not, Rogers,” Tony said. “Seriously, though. Gloves, or shaking?”

“Well, I-- as a super soldier who fights with his hands-- would say gloves. As a wizard with telekinesis and a flair for personal aesthetic--”

“Gloves are ugly,” Tony agreed. “Somewhat unnecessary. The real problem is the pain, but I haven’t found anything to deal with that yet.” Almost unconsciously, his hand went to his chest. 

“Your arc reactor--” 

“The scars around hurt, but all in a day’s work, amirite? You get used to it, Steve.” 

“I’m sorry.”

“What did I just say? Used to it.”

“Doesn’t make it hurt less.”

Tony shrugged. “I’m working on the gloves anyway. I need something to do.”

“Do you want an assistant?”

“Sure, if they’re a competent one.”

“I’ll do my best,” Steve sighed, following Tony to a lab-- not the textile lab, but one more suited to working with metal. 

...

“Gimme one of those long thin bits,” Tony said, bent over a messy prototype. Steve obeyed. 

“Needlenose.”

Steve looked out over his array. He recognized the needlenose pliers; he handed them to Tony. 

Tony did something which warranted a soft “damn” and gave the pliers back to Steve to put away. 

“Give me another long thin one.”

Tony took this one over to a drill press, drilling two holes in it, before returning to the workbench. 

“Hand me a two point eight.”

“A what?”

“A screw. Keep up, Rogers.”

Steve had a variety of screws sitting in front of him, so Tony’s clarification wasn’t exactly... clarifying. 

“There are different kinds...”

“Yes, and I need a 2.8-- oh, I’ll get it.” Tony spun his chair over to Steve and snatched one of the screws. “Look, they have numbers on their boxes!”

They did, in fact, have numbers, but there were many different numbers per box. One of those numbers was a 2.8.

“You’re lucky you’re cute,” Tony muttered, swinging a lens over the metal to magnify his work, “or I’d fire ya.”

“You didn’t hire me,” Steve said, slightly bemused. 

The screw slipped out of Tony’s fingers, the only indication being the sound it made as it landed on the floor. 

“Fucking hell.”

Steve bent to get it, and found it immediately. He handed it back to Tony and waited. 

“Shit.”

The screw had dropped again.

“Everything okay?”

“Give me that-- third time’s the charm. Normally, this is where I’d ask my assistant-- but your hands are a lot bigger than Pepper’s.”

The third time was, in fact, the charm. 

“Gimme another 2.8.”

“We’re not going to have to go through this again, are we?” Steve asked in exasperation. 

Tony got the screw in without incident. “Try this on,” he said, handing it to Steve. 

The prototype braced Steve’s palm and the back of his hand, with thin strips of metal leading down his wrist to stop halfway up his forearm. 

“It’s stiff,” Steve said.  

“Curl your fingers.”

Steve did so, but couldn’t form a fist around the circle in his palm. Tony ripped off the offending metal and put the tip of his finger in its place. 

“Curl.”

Steve was able to wrap his hand around Tony’s finger. 

“Good.”

“Hey.” Steve floundered for a moment, wondering how to breach the topic he wanted to bring up. 

“Hi.”

“Are you flirting with me on purpose?” Steve said finally.

“I flirt with everyone, Rogers.”

“You didn’t before.”

“Before... oh, before you came out? Don’t let that worry you.”

Steve shook his head, bending his wrist against the prototype. “Stiff joints.”

“Stop bad-mouthing my prototypes, asshole.”

Steve removed it from his hand carefully, and Tony put it back on the workbench, already stripping pieces off. 

“I didn’t flirt with many guys at all, before. You know how it is to live life in the public eye.”

“Yeah, I do.”

“Still had it in the back of my head that I’d be, you know.” Tony made an indecipherable gesture. 

“What changed?”

Tony shrugged. “Peter’s good influence?”

“Sure,” Steve agreed. 

“Why?” Tony asked, spinning around in the chair, picking up a tool he’d neglected to ask Steve for. “Did you want me to flirt with you on purpose?”

“Definitely not. Don’t take this the wrong way, Tony, but you look like your dad,” Steve said, hoping his admission would come across in his statement. 

“Oh. My. God.”

“What?”

“You kissed my dad!”

“I did  _ not! _ ” Steve shrieked childishly. 

“You  _ thought  _ about it.”

“He was good-looking and smart!” Steve said in his defense. “I thought about it once or twice, okay.”

Tony made a noise of disgust with more drama than Steve thought the situation warranted. “He was also an asshole.”

“Not to me.”

“How long did you know him?” Tony asked rhetorically, rolling his eyes. “In what context? Whatever. So, we figure you’re physically younger than me but really much older,” Tony said, switching topics. “Doesn’t that make it weird to date anyone?”

“That’s what I told Natasha,” Steve explained. 

“Snips.”

Steve handed over the snips. “Not a lot of shared life experiences, you know.”

“Not a lot of people who fight in World War 2 and then stay young enough to fight alien invaders in the 21st century,” Tony agreed. 

“Certainly not many who grew up in Brooklyn, fought with the Howling Commandos, turned into super soldiers, were frozen for years--” Steve stopped. 

Tony, quietly, asked, “Can you please give me the black wire?”

...

Clint handed Steve a coffee as soon as Steve walked in from his run.

“So,” he said. “You and Tony.” 

“What about it?”

Clint wiggled his eyebrows. 

“You’ve got the wrong idea,” Steve said. 

“Sure I do.”

“Clint, I knew his dad.”

“You fucked Howard Stark?”

“Clint, what the  _ hell? _ ” Steve hissed, almost dropping the coffee. 

“I wouldn’t judge,” Clint offered. 

“I didn’t-- I didn’t even kiss him!” Steve whispered loudly. 

“You had a  _ crush _ on Howard Stark,” Clint said, nodding sagely. 

“All I said was I knew his dad, as in, to me, he is a generation younger than I.”

“Am I wrong?” Clint asked, sipping his coffee with raised eyebrow. 

Steve rolled his eyes. 

“Thought not. So. What are you and Tony doing if not screwing in the lab?”

“Why are you so casual about stuff like that?” Steve demanded. 

“Comes with the biology,” Clint said, tapping his head. “Ace-- ask Peter about it, but it means I really couldn’t give a shit about sex. It’s fun, though.”

“Whatever you say,” Steve said. “Tony and I are friends.”

“You and I are friends.”

“Are we?

“Sure. What do you two best buds talk about?”

Steve thought for a minute, and then answered honestly. “Guys.”

“Yeah? Who?”

Steve shook his head. “Tony’s making Stephen some gloves.”

“Stephen?  _ Dr. Strange? _ ”

“Yeah.”

“True love,” Clint sighed, hand over heart. 

“That’s what I said!”

“The snark would murder us,” Clint said, downing the rest of his coffee. “I know you just ran, but do you wanna go hit some targets with me?”

...

“When you said ‘hit some targets’--”

“Real targets, yes.”

“I didn’t think you meant  _ mission!”  _ Steve spat over the comms. “Is this allowed?”

“No? I don’t know, Steve. Focus on the job.”

“Tracker heading north, 25 miles per hour,” Steve sighed, perched atop an office building. 

“Thanks. Tell me when he reaches the intersection.”

“Three... two... one. Now.”

There was an explosion. 

“Nailed it!”

“ _ Clint. _ ” 

“Is that not respectful? Steve, this guy knew he was a bitchass informant helping people get killed, even if he didn’t know he was informing Hydra.”

“You told me none of this, remember? You just stuck me on a roof with a comm unit and a laptop.”

“Oh, yeah!”

“So what does it look like?”

“Vehicle malfunction, if we skedaddle. Cheap old car battery, corroded.”

Steve leapt off the roof onto the neighboring one, and caught sight of Hawkeye doing the same across the street. 

“You’re insane. This is your idea of fun?”

“Sure.” 

It was exhilarating, at the very least. Avengers Tower had no access from the sky for non-flying humans, so Clint and Steve entered the front door. 

Natasha smacked Clint. 

“Hey!”

“I was looking for Steve, bird-boy. You could have told me you were taking him.”

“Why were you looking for Steve?” Steve asked. 

“Wilson and Rhodey showed up-- they’re staying for dinner. Figured you guys would want to talk.”

“Of course,” Steve agreed. 

...

Sam and Rhodey and Tony and Steve and Clint were in the living room, swapping stories. Peter crashed in at one to have lunch. 

“Hey, Peter!” Sam called. 

“Hi, War Machine! Hi, Falcon!” Peter yelled back, swinging into the kitchen. 

Bruce stumbled up a little while after Peter, looking for the young hero. 

“He’s having lunch,” Tony said, pointing. 

“I should, too,” Bruce determined, making a sandwich for himself. 

“Is Dr. Strange coming by for dinner again?” Peter asked. 

Tony looked at Steve. “Do you have a way to contact him?”

“Why would I?”

“I don’t know. Does he own a cell phone?”

“He’s a sorcerer, not a monk,” Clint said. 

“Pepper would know,” Sam said. 

Tony stared at Sam in amazement. “You’re right!”

“Yeah, I am, sometimes.” 

“Excuse me, then.” Tony got up and walked away, presumably to find Pepper.

“Why isn’t she down here more often?” Rhodey asked.

“If you were a normal woman just trying to live your life running your ex-boyfriend’s company and his mostly male superhero team’s P.R., where would you not want to be?” Clint asked rhetorically. 

“She hangs out with Natasha,” Steve offered. 

Peter sat in Tony’s vacated seat, holding a plate with a very odd sandwich on it. 

“Peter, what the hell is in that?” Sam asked. 

“Bread? Butter, ketchup, cilantro, green onion, bacon, turkey, avocado, feta, and sea salt and vinegar potato chips,” Peter listed. 

Rhodey mimed gagging.

“Maybe I’m old-fashioned, but I’d much rather have a pbj right now,” Steve said. 

“Are you offering to make some?” Sam asked, perking up. 

“I’d love one,” Clint said, raising his finger lazily. 

Steve rolled his eyes. “Freeloaders,” he said, committing himself to making a whole plate. 

Tony arrived back just as Steve was setting them down. Peter was snuggled down into the chair, having finished the hideous concoction they called a sandwich. Tony stared down contemplatively for a long while; it seemed he couldn’t quite bring himself to force Peter out. 

“Dr. Strange is coming for dinner,” he said instead. 

“He is?” Peter cried, leaping up. In an instant, Tony had stolen the chair back. “Heeeey! Mr. Staaaark!”

“Snooze you lose, kid,” Tony said, propping his feet on the coffee table. 

Peter looked around; Tony and Sam both occupied chairs, and Steve, Clint and Rhodey shared a couch with little room to spare. 

Peter plopped themselves down across Clint and Rhodey’s lap, torso tucked securely against Steve. “This works,” they stated. 

Rhodey looked at the legs he was wearing as a seat belt and opened his mouth, but said nothing. Clint acted like nothing happened. Steve put an arm around Peter. 

_ Dad, _ Sam mouthed, pointing at Steve. Steve shrugged. 

Bruce walked in, took stock of the situation, muttered, “This is touching...” and walked out to sit with Natasha, who had just entered the room.

...

By the time Stephen found them, there was a pointless Steve & Sam v. Tony & Rhodey argument happening about military procedure; Clint had taken his hearing aids out and was napping against Steve and Peter was curled up in Steve’s lap against Clint, listening in fascination and occasionally interjecting with a joke. 

Bruce and Natasha were in the other room. Stephen turned to them. 

“Don’t look at us,” Bruce said. “Your boyfriend is over there.”

Stephen sputtered.

“Merlin!” Tony said. “Kind of you to drop by!”

“You asked me to,” Stephen said. 

“Do you have a phone?” Rhodey asked. 

“Of course I have a phone,” Stephen said, derision in every syllable. 

“What? Figured sorcerers didn’t want to deal with technology or whatever.”

“I love technology,” Stephen said monotonously. He stepped into the air and sat down on nothing. “How have you been? Blow anything up?”

“Yes!” Rhodey said excitedly. “Tony, you know your tech is the best, but we have a new vendor who could give you a run for your money...”

...

“Any requests?” Steve shouted to the room at large. 

“Pasta!” Peter yelled back. 

“Not pasta!” Natasha shouted. 

“Indian or Greek?” Steve asked instead. 

After everyone except Tony replied “Greek,” Steve set to work. 

Bruce walked in to take drinks out to the Avengers. “Do you need any help?”

“I don’t think I’m allowed any.”

“Oh, right. The bet. Good luck, Steve,” Bruce said, shaking his head as he left. 

Natasha was appreciative of the meal, but smiled at Steve evilly all the same.

...

Steve was deeply involved in conversation with Sam when out of the corner of his eye he saw Rhodey following Peter outside. Steve grinned. 

...

“Peter’s down with Bruce again,” Tony said, accepting the espresso Steve gave him. “Wanna be my assistant again?”

“I was going to go on a run.”

“I’d join you, but I’m slow and I loathe running.”

“I’ll be back soon,” Steve said. 

As soon as he was back, Steve showered and changed into something shop-suitable and joined Tony once more.

“How much work did you do without me?”

“A bit. Try this on.”

The new prototype braced Steve’s palm only in the center, but thin sheets of metal on hinges covered the rest of the palm, allowing Steve to open and close his fist. The metal on the back went from just before his wrist all the way to his second knuckles, with the appropriate joints allowing freedom of movement. Steve tried moving his hand-- there were small springs in the joints, making his hand want to stay in a natural resting position, but he could move with little resistance. 

The hinge across his knuckles expanded as he bent his hand, but when he opened his fingers, it bit his skin. 

“Ow.”

“Baby,” Tony said, freeing Steve from the prototype. “Opinions?”

“It’s nice. Why are you testing it on me?”

“Because you’re here,” Tony explained. “And because I’m assuming your grip strength is higher than mine. Ideally, I’d test this out on you and then on someone like...” Tony frowned. “Everyone in this entire compound is athletic or superpowered, right?”

“You could ask Pepper?”

“She swore off assistant-ing after I made her put the arc reactor back in my chest.”

“Here’s an idea-- test it out on Stephen.”

“Do you have no concept of a surprise, Rogers? File.”

“Which one?”

“The flat one.”

Steve obeyed. 

Tony filed vigorously for a few moments, then slipped it onto Steve’s hand. “Better, don’t you think?”

Steve watched it flexing around his fingers. “How much of the hand are you expecting to cover?”

“Check this shit out.” Tony brought up a page filled with computerized sketches and images pulled from google. “From just below the heel of the hand to just above the knuckles.”

“Like metal fingerless gloves?”

Tony frowned. “You made it sound douchey.”

“Sorry,” Steve said, rolling his eyes. “If they’re orange, they’ll blend in with his magic.”

“Good idea, Cap!” Tony said, pointing with the glove-clad hand. “DUM-EE, get me those safety glasses.”

The robot whirred as it obeyed, throwing two pairs at Tony with considerable force. 

“Thank you, idiot. Put these on.”

Steve took the pair offered to him. 

The lab was filled with the incredibly loud sounds of metal being cut and ground to Tony’s satisfaction. 

“Yeah?” Tony asked, offering the glove to Steve. 

“Still doesn’t look like much, Tony.”

“A mini hydraulic system to keep them in place-- sensors to let the hydraulics release when Stephen wants to move his hand-- they’ll be perfect.”

“How are you going to give them power?”

“These are tiny, I can use kinetic charging.”

“Okay,” Steve agreed. “When are you going to do this?”

“I’ll have the prototypes done by today, if you continue assistant-ing,” Tony said. 

...

Stephen came on a surprise visit that day, but luckily, when Stephen portalled directly into the lab, the glove prototypes were sitting behind the computer Tony was using to write up their initial coding. Steve was doodling what he thought the gloves should look like, but swiftly lifted his sketchbook so the picture left Stephen’s view. 

“You’re in a different lab,” Stephen noticed. 

“I have a lot of them,” Tony said. “Perks of being a billionaire. What’s up, Eragon?”

Stephen squinted at Tony, not recognizing the reference. “Something’s come up, actually.”

“You need aid?”

“Can I portal you to the Sanctum?”

“Go for it.”

_ Don’t mind me, _ Steve thought, watching in amusement. Stephen opened the portal, walking Tony through with a hand on his back. 

They vanished. 

Steve resumed his drawing, shading the table on which two crossed hands lay. 

...

“There you go,” Steve said when Tony returned three hours later, holding out the drawing. “Proper wizard aesthetic. Do you want lunch?”

“Depends on what lunch is.” 

“Sandwiches, like always?”

Tony groaned, taking the drawing. “I’d have to make one, though.”

“Correct.” Steve left for the kitchen. Peter was taking a lunch break too. 

“Mr. America, you’re friends with Falcon, right?”

“Yeah.”

“He’s not here anymore and I don’t know how to talk to him.”

Steve sent a text to Sam, saying that Peter wanted to see him again. 

SamWilson: why?

Steve: maybe he thinks your suit is cool

SamWilson: because it is

Steve: so will you drop by sometime?

SamWilson: friday. 

“He’ll be here Friday.” 

“Thanks, Mr. America!” Peter said, putting the finishing touches on their obnoxious sandwich. 

“What are you eating today?”

“Cream cheese and nutella.”

Steve couldn’t suppress a shudder. “That’s disgusting, Peter.”

“Don’t knock it ‘till you try it!” they said excitedly, taking a big bite. 

Steve returned to Tony with a yogurt and a spoon, just in case. Tony emerged from the lab long enough to eat the yogurt and then retreated back inside with Steve trailing behind. 

“So what happened at the Sanctum?” Steve asked.

“Something warded against magic-users that also had a bunch of physical locks on it. Stephen had me open the locks, and then they were able to break the magic or something something. It was pretty fun.”

“Fun?”

“Sure. Like a puzzle.”

“Whatever you say.”

“That drawing’s pretty good, by the way. Can I hire you as my secretary?”

“I didn’t think secretaries normally did art.”

“Art secretary, then. Hand me that.” 

“Do you need a secretary?”

“I’ve always needed a secretary-- Pepper helped me out for a long time, but now she says she has more important things to do.”

“Like running your company and your team’s PR.”

“Like that.”

Tony clicked a button on the computer, and a huge chamber off to the side started whirring. 

“What’s it doing?” Steve asked, peering curiously into the chamber, where layers of powder were accumulating on the bed. 

“You’ve never... you’ve never seen a 3D printer.” Tony looked from the machine to Steve and back. “It prints in 3D. I don’t know how else to explain it.”

“That’s incredible!” Steve said, watching in fascination. 

“The miracle of the 21st century,” Tony muttered. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Almost done, folks. Got a single-chapter part 2 written, even.


	6. Gossip From Like the 15th Century to Today

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nat dresses up, Loki helps, and a gala is attended, much to Tony's relief.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote the whole thing in one go and then split it into chapters, which is why all the chapter breaks are hella awkward.

Peter rejoined Tony in his lab the next day, having come to a conclusion that they needed to be working on the Secret Project more than they needed to be working on Bruce’s memory chemistry. 

Simultaneously, Tony determined that the next step in his glove project was getting measurements, which was understandably hard to do subtly. 

“You could ask Wong,” Peter said, after Tony told them the struggles. 

“Maybe,” Tony said, “But I have no way to contact Wong.”

The pair invited Steve in to the textiles shop. Tony was grinning maniacally, and Peter was springing everywhere, clearly excited. 

“What’s going on?” 

“You get to try it on!” Peter shrieked, falling as they turned. Steve picked them up from the floor. 

“I thought you were supposed to be coordinated?”

Tony rolled his eyes. “They’ve crashed into, dropped, or mangled everything in this God damned shop.”

“Language!” Steve said, as Peter squeaked, “Watch your profanity!” in an odd voice. 

Tony let loose a wholly uncreative string that seemed to consist of every curse word he could remember at the moment, including quite a few in languages other than English. Steve and Peter made identical shocked faces as Steve covered Peter’s ears. 

Peter said something in a reprimanding tone of voice, but it wasn’t English. Steve would guess Italian. Tony responded questioningly in kind, and Peter babbled an excited response. 

“You both know Italian?”

“You don’t?” Tony asked rhetorically. “Try on the suit before my child literally explodes.”

Peter flung themselves out of the room and returned mere seconds later with a suit. “Mr. America, here it is! Wait. Don’t look, okay? Just put it on and then look. But don’t look while you’re putting it on.”

“I can’t do that.”

Peter shrugged. 

Steve took the suit to a nearby bathroom and changed. The new suit was... exactly like his old one, but in pink, blue, and purple hues. The colors had a sharp quality, and the design fought valiantly against the stereotypes of pink and purple to make Steve look like a soldier and not a joke. 

“Do I get to keep it?” Steve asked when he emerged, thinking that he would absolutely wear it to battle. 

“Sure,” Tony said. “I also have your old red white and blue, and that newer black-grey model. But I need that one back. Does it fit well?”

“It fits exactly like the other ones.”

“Good.”

Steve was shooed to the bathroom, and he changed again and handed the suit to Peter. 

“It looks so good!” they gushed. 

“Yes, it does. Thank you, Peter.”

Peter smiled maniacally. 

...

Sam Wilson had received the duck chat. Natasha and Clint had both gone in for suit fittings. Tony had mysteriously acquired measurements-- after Wong had dropped by on an errand, so Steve supposed it wasn’t so mysterious. 

Steve was on day seven of cooking dinner, and both Dr. Strange and the Asgardians had said that they were coming along. 

Today was pizza, because Tony had a huge oven that could fit pizzas large enough to feed twenty people each-- or maybe one super soldier, one enhanced teenager, and two Asgardians. Steve had actually wrangled Natasha’s help despite the bet, but in all likelihood it was because she was pickiest about pizza toppings. 

Dr. Strange showed up, and was mobbed Peter and Tony. Tony shooed Peter and led Stephen back to the lab that Steve knew housed the completed stabilizing gloves. A dismayed Peter joined Steve and Natasha in the kitchen and insisted on helping put toppings on. 

The Bifrost showed up on the balcony, depositing Thor and a stunningly beautiful woman in a black and gold dress, accented by jade jewelry. 

“Loki!” Peter yelled excitedly. 

Natasha dropped mushrooms all over the floor. 

...

“So,” Steve said, sitting with Natasha later, pencil and paper. “Would you wear something strapless?”

“Depends,” she said indifferently. “I haven’t tried to set you up with anyone in a while, have I?”

“Not since Bucky returned,” Steve agreed. 

“If you go on a date with someone of my choosing, I’ll wear something strapless.”

Steve grinned. “Lucky for you, I don’t care that much.” He added sleeves to the drawing.

“Isn’t strapless a little scandalous for you?”

“Funnily enough, strapless dresses are not the most progressive thing about this new century,” Steve said. 

“What if I told you that the date was with a team member?”

Steve hazarded a guess that would make him sound really stupid if his assumption was wrong. “He’s interested in Strange.”

“Tea!” Natasha said. Steve had only caught onto that one two weeks ago, and counted himself lucky. “Please tell.”

“He made gloves for Stephen.”

“He makes tech habitually, for everyone,” Nat replied. So Steve had assumed correctly. 

Steve shook his head. “I think it’s different. But he’s certainly not interested in me, and you can trust me on that one.”

Nat made a heart with her hands and broke it apart sadly. “Are you sad?”

“Didn’t I say something to you a long time ago about shared experiences?”

“Sure.”

“I was never interested in Tony. For one thing, he’s too old for me.”

“You’re almost 100!”

“Not mentally.”

Natasha nodded pensively. 

“Would you rather have a... you know, like a big puffy thing, or tight?” Steve asked, gesturing to Nat's waist. 

“Tight.”

“Good,” Steve said, sweeping his pencil across the widest skirt he could draw. 

...

Stephen had the gloves on next time Steve saw him. 

“Nice gloves,” Steve said. “Tony wasn’t sure you’d want them.”

“Of course I want them. They’re brilliant. Tony said you helped.”

“I don’t know the first thing about tech.”

“Artistic ability, he told me.”

“I did a little concept art.” 

Steve had redone the drawing earlier, compelled to change one of the crossed gloved hands to a smaller hand, lacerated with surface scratches from all the time spent in the machine shop and digging into damaged metal. 

“Thank you,” Stephen said quietly. “I keep trying to thank Tony, but he insists that he isn’t deserving of thanks.”

“That’s Tony for you,” Steve said. 

“You know him pretty well?”

“Sure. We fought each other, then we fought side by side, then we fought each other...”

“And now?”

“We work together,” Steve said. “We’re friends; I don’t know.”

“You seem to be good for him.”

“He’s happier now, that’s for sure, but it’s all Peter. Tony likes having a protegee. I doubt I helped; it took Peter to bring us back together after the Sokovia accords.”

Stephen nodded slowly. “If there’s no way I can thank Tony, maybe a gift?”

“Bring coffee to his lab,” Steve joked. “He’ll love it. Don’t buy him anything; he’s worth billions.”

“Coffee?”

“Just ask Peter-- and they’ll put in an order for something sugary. You bring them both coffee and watch out for flying children.”

Stephen looked alarmed, and Steve hastened to explain. “Peter crashes into me a lot.”

“Thank you,” Stephen said. 

...

Steve, now released from coffee duty, spent time assistanting for Bruce, working with Clint and Natasha, doing smaller public appearances as designed by Pepper, and hanging out with Thor and Loki whenever they were on Midgard. Loki had taken swiftly to how accepting the avengers were, and changed the illusion accordingly depending on what kind of day it was. Loki’s fashion sense as a female may have been, if possible, more flamboyant. It was Loki, dressed in a gorgeous armored tunic and black leggings with hair pinned high in curls, who sat with Steve and worked through the last bit of Natasha’s dress. 

“That’s what I have so far,” Steve said, passing the paper over. 

Loki looked over the drawing with interest. “You said it would be pink?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s going to clash with Natasha’s red hair,” she sighed, gazing off into nothing. “You can’t just pick any shade of pink.”

“Would you like to help me?”

“Hmm... perhaps.”

“My sister loves fashion!” Thor interrupted, clapping Loki’s shoulder. “She also loves to criticize my fashion choices! Don’t let her fool you into believing she does not wish to help.”

“Thank you, Thor,” Loki said through gritted teeth. “Please leave.”

Thor wandered off, and Loki resumed looking at the drawing. She and Steve picked through the skirt (do you know how to make it pouf like that? Loki asked, and Steve replied that of course he did not. Loki said she wasn’t so much an expert in the physics of dresses, but Steve would need something stiff under the skirt or in the hem to help it out) and then the top (that’s ugly. Excuse you? Steve demanded, and Loki pointed to the neckline. Is your goal to embarrass her? Natasha doesn’t mind about low necklines. Then by Frigga, make it a halter top!) and finally Steve’s decorative flair (what are these? Flowers. And Loki gazed sadly at the paper. A child would wear this-- you could at least cluster them). 

In the end, Steve had something that was beautiful, but it was certainly not Natasha’s style, and of course it was bright fuschia. He seeked Nat out later that day to get her okay on the style, and was eventually able to wrangle her into agreeing that if Nat wore a sports bra and leggings under the dress, and was able to slip it off quickly, she would actually be considerably more mobile than if she had been wearing a tight or mermaid style dress. 

If Steve knew Nat, she would not wear a sports bra or leggings, but she would hide several weapons under the voluminous skirt, and then if there was a fight, she’d kick the offenders’ asses in the dress and “accidentally” destroy it in the process. 

The next day, Loki showed up in a smart black suit and green tie, ready to go shopping with Steve and Nat. 

“Don’t you wear any other colors?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Why’s he here?” Natasha asked suspiciously.

“Artistic consultant,” Steve said, showing her his original drawing, and then the one with Loki’s corrections. 

Nat made a face at the first drawing and said, “He can stay.”

They started at some of the most expensive shops, at Loki’s insistence. Natasha seemed to want to try on every dress except what Steve was looking for, and had to be gently dragged across the mall. 

They found several dresses with the shape that Steve wanted, but all were rejected by Loki due to the precise shade of pink. (Natasha rejected them too, but Steve wasn’t taking her into consideration.) They finally found a couple that Loki didn’t hate, but when Natasha tried them on, one was all wrong and the other didn’t fit quite right. 

“We can get it altered!” Natasha said, exasperated. 

“Don’t you like shopping?” 

“When I’m looking for something I like, sure,” she replied, pulling a pile of pink frill behind her as she walked to the counter. 

The end result was magnificent, in Steve’s opinion. Bright curls of fabric left Nat’s knees on display in the front, but the back trailed on the floor. There was something stiffening the hems of each layer of skirt that forced the whole bundle into waves. It was completed with a halter top and plenty of beading. 

“Tonight, you better make something good for dinner,” Nat grumbled as they made their way to a tailor. 

The tailor, a thin old man with lightly tinted sunglasses that he wore even inside the building, didn’t appear to recognize Steve, Natasha or Loki. He started measuring Natasha, who stood stiffly and was sending constant pained glances over at Steve. 

Loki ran his fingers under his collar on the left of his neck, back and forth. Natasha sent him a glance. He cast his gaze around calmly, but it looked out of the ordinary to Steve, who knew that the Norse god had a talent for being unnervingly still. 

When Natasha was done and they’d been given a day to pick up the dress from the white-mustached tailor, Loki led them out of the shop, and as he crossed the threshold, something wavered. 

“Don’t cast illusions here!” Natasha hissed. 

“I was not seen!” Loki replied heatedly. Steve caught immediately onto the new tailoring of the suit Loki wore-- the pinch at the waist. More telling was the new part in her suddenly curled dark hair. 

“Leave it,” Steve muttered to Natasha. 

Natasha assessed, and appeared to resolve to ask later. 

Back at the tower, Loki made her way to the textile shop. Steve was sure Peter and Tony had something for the Norse god. 

...

Steve passed by Natasha’s room on his way to wake Clint, and found it lined with colors. 

Large, high-quality flags of no country Steve knew hung on the wall. All were striped; two had triangles. These must be the Pride flags, Steve realized. 

“Oh. Finally seeing my collection?”

“This is extensive.”

“Thanks,” Nat said. “See yours?”

Steve pointed to the pink, blue, purple flag. “I’ve had that there since Tony,” Nat said. “So what’s Loki’s deal?”

“Genderfluid.”

“I don’t know that one yet,” Natasha said, but she didn’t want an explanation. “Go wake up Clint. Good luck.”

“Thanks,” Steve laughed. 

...

Picking up a sleepy Clint Barton was like picking up a cat. Not only was Clint a heavy sleeper, he also couldn’t hear, so Steve resorted to this method-- dragging him physically out of bed. 

He was awake, he just didn’t want to... wake up. 

Steve rolled his eyes as Clint slid with athletic grace out of his arms and onto the floor. Steve grabbed the box on the bedside table and handed it to Clint, who obligingly took the hearing aids. 

“Pepper wants us,” Steve said, signing clumsily. 

Clint signed back something that may or may not have been an affirmation, finally hauling himself to his feet of his own accord. He held his hand palm out for “five more minutes.”

“If you’re not up in six minutes, I’m sending Peter in next,” Steve threatened very slowly as he tried to sign along with his words. 

Clint nodded and turned toward his dresser. Steve walked away towards Peter’s room. 

Waking Peter was much more interesting than waking Clint, as Steve soon discovered. He barely managed not to shout when he walked in the room to find that Peter had cocooned themselves-- in webbing, anchored to the bed and three walls.  

“Peter?” Steve whispered, stepping closer.

Peter blinked awake, yawning, already smiling at Steve. At least they were a light sleeper. 

“Can you get out?”

“Oh, sure,” Peter said. “This is a different kind of web.” They cast the web aside easily as they sat up. 

“Why do you have it?”

“To make hammocks out of, obviously,” Peter said, jumping out of bed and stretching. “I’ll be out in a minute, I promise.” 

Steve left. Barton was probably asleep again; as soon as Peter was dressed, he was siccing them on the lazy agent. 

...

“Incredible,” Bruce drawled, as Peter came into the room in jeans and a tee trailed by Clint in joggers and an inside-out shirt. “He’s actually awake.”

Clint’s hair was stuck to the side of his face. 

Bruce handed Clint a coffee, which he accepted with a quickly signed ‘thanks’. 

Pepper, dressed in a sleek business suit with her hair and makeup done and quite more put together than the Avengers, held out a flyer. “Gala. Proceeds to lung cancer research. Everyone on the team is slated to attend; heard there’s a lot of scientists in attendance, so they might have questions about the serum,” (she looked at Steve) “or radiation,” (she looked to Bruce) “or other super enhancements. The rest of you are to stand there and look pretty.” 

“Fantastic,” Natasha mumbled. 

“Tony is, quite unfortunately, still the team’s official spokesperson, so he’s doing the opener for the gala, introducing a guest of honor. I’ve written the statement and  _ you are not to go off script. _ ”

Tony made a “who, me?” face. 

“Would there be... press, in attendance?” Natasha asked. 

“Of course,” Pepper replied. 

“So Stark would be making a statement... to the press...” 

“To the guests in attendance, yes, but the-- did you bet on something?”

“Yes!” Tony said, but Steve knew it was actually because he was relieved the bet payoff would happen earlier and not during the unknown press conference he cared so much about. 

“I’ll be nice if you help me get back at Steve,” Nat said. 

“Deal,” Tony agreed. 

“Christ,” Pepper said, rubbing her temples. “Just... be prepared by three, and don’t do anything stupid.” 

“Will do, hon,” Tony said, walking out with Peter trailing along like a puppy. Stephen followed, looking slightly bemused, when Tony beckoned. 

Bruce, Clint and Natasha made their way to the floor’s common room. In all likelihood, they’d all settle down to read and Clint would inevitably fall asleep. Scott and Hope trailed after Pepper for more details. 

“Wanna go for a run?” Steve asked Sam. 

“Are you going to lap me and continually shout ‘on your left’?” Sam asked. 

Steve didn’t reply. 

“I’ll go with you,” Rhodey said.

...

Steve’s super-hearing caught Rhodey’s words “Next time, we suit up and see how he keeps up with us then!” 

“Now, that’s not fair,” Steve said, coming to a halt much more elegantly than either of the military men. “I don’t have a super suit.”

Sam shot him a distinctly unimpressed look. “Poor you. Baby.” 

...

Loki showed up later, even though she wasn’t going to the gala. As it turned out, she had taken the bifrost to the tower with the express purpose of seeing Natasha in her dress. 

Nat had a stormy look on her face when she emerged in the dress. She had elegant lipstick and silver heels to match, but for all that she looked good in the dress, she certainly didn’t look happy to be wearing it. 

Steve, who was waiting for her appearance, grinned and started to walk away. 

“Wait. Rogers, can you get Stark out here for me?” Natasha asked. 

“Sure,” Steve said. 

He found Stephen still in Tony’s lab. With effort, he seemed to be taking notes down on a sheet of paper. 

They were legible, which for a doctor with permanent nerve damage in his hands was incredible. 

“New gloves working out for you?”

“Yes, they’re quite helpful... oh, Steve.”

“Hi. Natasha wants you.”

“Me?” Tony asked, hand over his heart. “Whatever for? It’s two o’clock.” 

“I don’t know how long makeup takes,” Steve said defensively.

“Ooh! I’ll go with you, Mr. Stark, I’ll go!” Peter exclaimed. 

Tony waved his hand and the lab started shutting itself down. Stephen left the paper and followed Tony and Peter out. “Makeup? I’d like to see this.” 

...

Scott, Clint, Pepper and Bruce were off somewhere else, but everyone else was clustered around Natasha. Tony was fidgeting as she layered more and more powder on his face. Steve thought he looked like he’d been a little airbrushed. She’d made all the colors on his face perfect. 

“It looks like you changed the shape of his face,” Stephen said contemplatively. 

Tony furrowed his brows in a distressed manner. Natasha made him make faces, and applied nude lipstick to his lips. When she got out the eyeliner pencil, he shied away. 

“I don’t want to look like Johnny Depp.”

“You won’t look like Johnny Depp,” Natasha said impatiently, holding his face still with an iron grip as she applied the liner. She sat back and observed her work. 

“Go get your suit on.”

Tony was up and away in a flash. The makeup wasn’t extremely obvious, but something about his face had certainly changed. Steve was impressed. 

“Miss-- Black Widow--” Peter started. 

“Call me Natasha,” Nat reminded them gently. 

“M... Natasha... can you do mine too?” Peter asked hopefully. 

“Sure,” Nat said, grinning softly. 

Peter received mascara and eyeliner. On their young face, it looked a little feminine. They sprinted off to check the mirror and put on a tailored suit that Pepper and Tony had gotten them after they grew out of their homecoming one. 

“Why didn’t you do all the... powder stuff?” Rhodey asked. 

“You have to ease into makeup,” Hope interjected. “You’re very good. Do you think you could share some techniques some time?”

“Sure,” Natasha said, cleaning up her supplies. 

...

The Avengers were not the center of attention at the gala, with so many other big name scientists in attendance. Tony gave his minute-long introduction, then stepped down and let the guest of honor take the floor.

Only an hour later, Peter had gotten exhausted talking to scientists, watching every word and being carefully policed by Tony and Steve in turns, and was curled up by Natasha’s side on a wide chair that wasn’t necessarily meant for two people. Natasha made the executive decision to give them to Clint to take home-- Clint, who operated less on brains and more on action and had very little patience, was all too willing to escape.

Tony and Peter’s new looks hit the tabloids lightly and faded in a day. Natasha’s dress landed her in fashion reviews (Fashion YES or Fashion MESS?) for a week afterward, but then silenced. 

...

Hope had started to drop by more often, sometimes with and sometimes without Scott. They were listed for the June 29th Mystery Event, so Steve wasn’t surprised when Peter took Hope on the duck chat. After that, Scott also started referring to Peter as “they,” so Steve assumed that Hope had simply shared the information with her SO. Hope, Natasha and Peter could often be found hanging out, sometimes with Pepper and occasionally with Loki in her feminine form. 

Upon finding out about this coalition of fierce females whose main idea of fun seemed to be trying makeup looks on Peter, Thor boomed, “I have some friends you might like to meet!”

“Lady Sif and Brunnhilde?” Loki guessed. 

Thor looked shocked. “You are correct, sister!” 

Loki rolled her eyes. “Please be aware that they know nothing about new Midgardian customs, brother, and Lady Sif was away when I re-introduced myself to our people.”

“She will learn,” Thor said confidently, and took the bifrost away. 

...

Lady Sif and Brunnhilde, the Valkyrie, were invited to dinner that night. Lady Sif stumbled through a few awkward questions about Loki and Peter but seemed, like Thor, to get it after a while. Brunnhilde did not focus on the questioning-- too busy talking to Hope-- but did share one thought on Loki’s identity. 

“Could I have been a Valkyrie, Brunnhilde?”

She rolled her eyes. “It involves racing  _ towards  _ danger, not  _ away _ .”

“Just because I resort to trickery doesn’t make my tactics less valid.” 

“Just less Valkyrie-like.” 

“True,” Loki agreed, and left the topic alone.

...

Steve was running out of meals he could feasibly cook for everyone that showed up without exhausting himself. At last count, he had the four Asgardians, Peter, Scott, Hope, Sam, Rhodey, Strange, and very occasionally Wong who were liable to drop in at any time and in any combination in addition to the tower’s six permanent residents. 

“You have enough money to buy us dinner every night!” he finally said to Tony, exasperated. 

“But does it beat good ol’ American home cooking? Besides-- you lost a bet. You got a day off for the gala, so take your wins where you can and don’t bring it up to Nat.”

But finally, the two weeks were over, and Natasha said as much, followed by “I’ll miss your cooking.”

“Thanks,” Steve sighed. 

...

Peter was learning how to do their own makeup, which was sometimes good and sometimes bad. Natasha, Pepper or Hope always did their makeup whenever they were leaving the tower unmasked, which Steve suspected was on order from Pepper. Loki was very fond of showing Peter pictures of various looks and suggesting they try, which left them looking in turns like a mess and a drag queen. 

Loki spent one day walking through the tower with a full face of makeup that could only be Peter’s handiwork. He didn’t look happy, nor did the makeup suit him. Steve supposed Peter had finally, unknowingly, gotten their revenge. 

Stephen kept being invited to the lab ostensibly for Tony to tinker with the gloves, but Steve saw more talking than tinkering when he dropped by with the coffee Peter demanded. 

“Getting along with our resident mechanic?” Steve asked Stephen later. 

“He doesn’t believe in magic,” Stephen said in wonderment. “How does he still not believe in magic?”

Steve shrugged. “ _ I  _ believe in magic-- but I grew up in the 1930’s, and anyway, sometimes I would believe that anything the Starks create is magic.” Steve meant that he thought tech was magic because he didn’t yet understand it.

“You make a good point,” Stephen said, “but no-one has come up with a plausible scientific explanation for this.” He portalled away. 

As far as having the last word went, that was a good way to do it, Steve supposed. 

When Stephen was away, Steve was back to being the coffee gofer, and took the opportunity one day to take three mugs and stay for a minute.

“You’ve been getting friendlier with Stephen,” Steve said. 

“Friendly is the wrong word,” Tony said. “He refuses to accept science and has a complete disregard for tech. He says his orange glowy shi-- stuff,” Tony amended, glancing at Peter. 

“Mr. Stark, I’m not a baby!”

“...is more useful than what I can create! As if! Has he ever created a source of clean energy that powers an entire body and personal weaponized suit?” Tony continued, ignoring Peter. 

“Hmm,” was all Steve said, understanding the epicenter of their petty squabble.

...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't, by the way, mean to imply that males wearing makeup is bad. But if a celebrity suddenly had a face full of makeup-- how would it actually go over? Tony knows.


	7. Peter Will Probably Die of Excitement

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The culmination!! (Don't worry, I have at least one one-shot to tack on the end of this series here.)

It was June first.

Peter rocketed around the tower, telling everyone present to come to a common room. Tony called Scott, Hope, Rhodey, Sam, and Stephen.

“How are we going to get Thor and Loki?” Tony asked Peter.

“HEIMDALL!” Peter screeched, staring upward. “CAN I TALK TO LOKI PLEASE?”

A distinctly disheveled, clearly-just-awake Loki appeared in a rainbow blast. She shook out her hair and her features faded to feminine as they watched.

“Can you ask Thor to come here?”

“HEIMDALL!” Loki shouted lazily. “This was unnecessar--!”

The bifrost carried her away.

...

Everyone waited expectantly for Tony to speak, as he was standing at the head of the room.

“Oh, don’t look at me,” he said finally. “Peter arranged this. They should tell you.”

Peter took a deep breath, and upon receiving an encouraging nod from Tony, shouted, “We’re going to San Francisco Pride! We have a float and everything! As the Avengers! And I made costumes for everyone! Well, Mr. Stark and I made costumes for everyone, but you probably all tried on your new suits already.”

Natasha started clapping, so for a brief minute, there was a round of applause for Peter.

Loki raised a hand. “What’s San Francisco Pride? And I’m not an Avenger.”

“Yes you are!” Thor exclaimed, going to clap Loki on the shoulder, but his hand passed through her image and she re-appeared a few feet away.

“Oh, it’s where people have a parade celebrating GSRM Pride!”

“What’s a San Francisco?”

“It’s a...” Peter appeared to be caught slightly off guard. “It’s a city.”

“Ah, I see.”

“So we’re all going to be on the float? In the parade?” Stephen asked.

“I guess you... don’t have to, if you don’t want to,” Peter replied uncertainty.

“Yes, you’re all going to be on the float,” Tony said. “All of you. The lovely Ms. Potts says it’s important for PR, but mostly, I would be very disappointed if you weren’t there to show support.”

“When?” Clint asked.

“June 29th,” Peter said. “Is that, um, all I need to say?”

“Any more questions?” Tony asked. When there were none, he said, “That’s all-- thanks,” and the group dispersed.

...

Peter had taken to sewing after having finished so many avengers costumes, and one day when Tony was busy, they asked Steve to come help.

Steve’s only talent lay in repairs, having needed such a skill back when he was tiny and getting beat up in alleys, but he was able to teach Peter the finer points of hand-stitching. In thanks, Peter sewed him a tank top in blue, pink and purple tones.They’d also sewn a cheesy patch of the old angular Captain America shield over the breast pocket. The shirt was a bit short and the collar bent inward where it hit the left shoulder, but Steve loved it. He showed it to Tony, who was immediately jealous.

...

June 21st.

Tony was not wearing makeup when he gave a press conference as Iron Man, stating his (and the entire Avenger’s) support of “everyone in the GSRM community”, and clarifying the term. Peter was, but they were only in the audience. There were cheers, and lots of questions. Tony answered very few, especially ignoring the ones demanding to know the sexualities of various Avengers.

He stepped off the stage, grinning at Peter.

...

June 28th.

No-one had seen another avenger’s pride suit except for Peter, so Tony’s large box got a lot of curious looks. He had his Iron Man gloves on, helping him with the weight of the box, and he moved toward the jet and dodged anyone looking for a peek. The box was covered; no one saw inside.

Pepper, Tony, Steve, Bruce, Clint, Sam, Rhodes, Scott, and Hope boarded the jet.  Thor and Loki would be joining them at their location, and Stephen was taking himself, Peter, and Natasha by portal three hours after the jet took off.

Three hours later, when the Avengers had settled into various hotel rooms, a portal opened in Pepper and Natasha’s room, depositing Natasha, Peter and Stephen. Pepper led Peter and Stephen to the room where Peter was staying. Stephen would be portalling back to the compound at night, and didn’t need a room.

Thor and Loki appeared, Thor in armor and Loki in a black suit, which both looked miserable for June in San Francisco.

They had dinner together in the city, barely fending off paparazzi and fans alike. Inadvisably, Peter was given ice cream late at night, but they came off their sugar high and fell immediately asleep at 11:30.

Tony was standing in the common area, unwilling to go into the room he shared with Rhodes quite yet. Steve found him there, talking with Pepper.

“...ever figure it all out, you know?” Tony was saying. “It’s not like physics; I can’t just do some math and see if I’m right.”

“It’s okay,” Pepper said. “All I know is that you’re _doing_ the right thing. Now. Does it really matter if you’re... oh, Steve?”

Steve hadn’t missed the way Pepper avoided finishing her sentence the moment she noticed him. That was okay; the conversation sounded private.

“I’m going to bed,” Pepper said. “Try to get some sleep.” She hugged Tony tightly. Surprised, he barely hugged back before she shuffled away on slippered feet.

“I haven’t seen her wear anything but heels before,” Steve noticed.

“You haven’t seen her outside of a professional setting before.” Tony grinned a private grin. “Why are you here, Captain?”

“Culture shock,” Steve said, because it felt as honest as anything else he could say.

“Thought you’d caught up with liberalism?”

“Oh, _I’m_ okay with everything. Some part of me believes I’m asking to get beat up in the back of some alley, though.”

“You’re going to get bashed online. Isn’t that the same thing?”

“We are?” Steve asked. Was he wrong in his assessment of American politics? Were they being too radical?

“Calm your shit, Rogers, it’s the outliers, not the norm,” Tony said. “By and large, gays are accepted now.”

“So I have to be prepared to defend myself?”

“You have to be prepared to ignore it,” Tony said, a warning suddenly in his tone. “Don’t pick fights with them.”

“I’ll want to,” Steve admitted.

“If you stay away from the twitter trolls, I’ll give you a lollipop,” Tony offered. “An interview on Fox or something.”

“Deal,” Steve said, grinning.

...

June 29th.

Peter shot out of their room at precisely 6:00 a.m., that having been the Avengers’ call time. They were already dressed in the agender spider suit.

Natasha had a form-fitted outfit in black and white, with large black triangles all pointing right. A few thin lines of purple and green shot from the tips of the triangles to wrap around her body. It looked sleek and sharp.

Steve was next dressed, and was wearing the pink-purple-blue version of his suit. Deep indigos, midnight blues, and magentas wove in the suit’s typical patterns, with a single outline around the star in hot pink.

Tony emerged in a white tee shirt with the arc reactor hole and worn jeans. Steve wondered at that, but Tony gave no clues as to why he wasn’t in costume. He had, however, covered the reactor in some sort of translucent film so it now projected a rainbow.

Bruce was dressed in a suit, which didn’t seem to bother him, despite the California summer heat. The jacket was rainbow. The sunglasses he accessorized with were also rainbow. Bruce’s style was... unique, Steve supposed.

Sam was dressed in a white tee and jeans, but had on the wing pack. Steve knew that when he flared the wings, there would be colors. He could wait.

Clint was in his natural habitat in purple, black, grey, and white. He had a little heart in blue-purple-pink over his breast pocket.

Pepper was dressed in a white suit, with a rainbow upside-down vee on her chest.

Rhodey-- Steve stopped to take in the colors on his shirt. Green, yellowgreen, yellow, white stumped him. “Are you aromantic?” Natasha asked. She was correct. Rhodey was also carrying a small case that could expand into the War Machine armor.

Scott was wearing a shirt that said “I <3 my gf” on it in the same colors as the pastel stripes gracing Hope’s body. It was the same flag that Steve hadn’t recognized hanging in the window on the day he saw the ducks with Peter: blue, pink, white, pink, blue. Steve also wasn’t surprised that neither of them had chosen to wear their superhero costumes, as they tended to try to keep those lives separate as much as they possibly could.

Thor’s cape matched Steve’s suit. When he emerged from his room and saw Steve, he laughed a booming laugh and held up his fist for a fistbump.

Loki had a pink-white-purple-black-blue heart centered on her chest, and a black outfit besides, which is the most anyone could have really asked for. Additionally, her wrist glowed pink with a strange ethereal light, as if she was wearing a bracelet but then replaced it with its astral-plane version. As she emerged, she held up her wrist for everyone to see, and quickly demonstrated how it turned blue as he became male and pink as she flipped back to female again.

Stephen portalled in later, at 7. The Cloak was rainbow, and he assured them it was only an illusion.

“Is this you coming out?” Steve asked.

“I’m not gay,” Stephen said. “But I like men.”

That was enough for Steve.

As they got ready to leave, Rhodey put on the War Machine armor, which had the same coloring as his shirt. Tony’s costume was also revealed. He pressed a button on what they’d all previously assumed was a belt, then slapped two bracelets on his wrists together. The Iron Man armor began building itself from the bracelets and belt outward. It matched Steve and Thor.

Thor insisted on a fist bump with Iron Man as well.

...

A newspaper was produced the next day, with the cover photo being one of the Avengers, decked as they were in Pride gear. Sam’s wings were open and displaying the same logo as Pepper’s shirt. Peter was hanging from a few bars that had been placed specifically so they could maneuver using them. Although the suit was full coverage, it was easy to see Peter’s mouth open.

Steve looked at the picture and knew that at the time, they had been screaming “This is the BEST DAY of my LIFE!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So y'all know what's going on. [ ] indicates author knows more than the reader.  
> Peter: agender bisexual  
> Nat: demi demi straight  
> Clint: bi ace  
> Bruce: gay grey  
> Tony: [bi]  
> Steve: bi  
> Thor: true bi  
> Loki: genderfluid + fluid sexuality  
> Stephen: [likes guys]  
> Pepper: calmly hetero  
> Scott: straightcis  
> Hope: straight trans post-transition  
> Sam: straightcis  
> Rhodey: aro straight 
> 
> Author: demi biromantic ace

**Author's Note:**

> so what do you think?


End file.
